Marek Reichman on designing a mid-engined Aston Martin

The Aston Martin Valhalla makes quite a statement. Whether visually, with its host of active aero features, or on paper thanks to its 1079hp hybrid powertrain, this is a road-legal Aston with an attitude like very few before it. 

It’s a mid-engined, all-wheel-driven supercar wearing the winged badge known predominantly for front-engined, rear-driven grand tourers. We simply had to have a walkaround with Marek Reichman, Aston Martin’s chief creative officer, to learn how the team channelled over a century of history into such a forward-thinking creation. 

Car Design News: The big question: how do you fit Aston Martin design cues and language into a new silhouette?

Marek Reichman: Historically, mid-engined cars haven't been part of our cultural thinking, but when you consider the length of time Valkyrie took [to make production] and the drive towards performance since we showed the first AM-RB 001 concept [in 2016], it's now ingrained within the designers what a mid-engined aesthetic for an Aston Martin looks like. 

Even with something as extreme as Valkyrie, which is so determined by aerodynamics because of its capability and its reduced cabin size, we were able to create the language of an Aston Martin with a mid-engine, always using what I would describe as the S-curvature – or moustache – at the front.

CDN: What differentiates the Valhalla design from Aston’s typical grand tourers?

MR: It’s all-wheel drive, so you're going to put emphasis over the driven front wheels, putting power in the front fenders. The inboard suspension lowers the scuttle line and gives you this beautiful view through to the tyres. We’re also aided by the fact that you have staggered wheels [20" front, 21" rear] giving a natural attitude to the car. A Formula One driving position, where your heel is higher than your hip, helps the designer because it means your butt sits lower in the car. Your head goes down, allowing us to create a lower car that accommodates taller adults with a helmet easily because of the seated position.

CDN: Does Valhalla have direct design links to other Aston Martins?

MR: It takes inspiration from Valkyrie in its thinking of negative space – the airflow space – and using that to create form and shape, as well as the traditional form and shape that you would know from something like Vanquish, a car which is more about the body than the arrow through the body. The proportion is exactly the same, you're just flipping it around. 

On a Vanquish, you have a long hood and a shorter cabin, whereas in Valkyrie or Valhalla, you have a long cabin and a shorter hood. You're still using the ancient principles of ‘golden proportion’ to get that instant reaction of beauty. That deploys itself through the side graphic of the car, the size of the glass compared to the body and the carbon area. The Valhalla is more about the layering of the car to give it some ‘liveness’; if you consider a Vanquish as clothed, a Valhalla takes the skin away to show you the sinews and structure beneath. 

We're using the negative airflow space through the body to determine some of the graphic language and break up of the car.

CDN: You must have worked intimately with the aerodynamicists to make the design work.

MR: Design and aerodynamics are usually contrasting philosophies, but weaving them together is the most important bit. You always start a design thinking, “I don't want to be the same as another product in that category.” We were working in conjunction with the aerodynamicists to define how we do it our way. Our early conversations concerned where the majority of the cooling air for the car would come from. 

We talked about allowing it through the front, which would then allow us to have a wing underneath the car operating similarly to the rear wing. You’re then feeding that air behind the front wheel, down the side, and into a lower air duct, which allows us to have a beautiful surface which a mid-engined application typically interrupts to let the air in. The dead front view is my favourite, because it's so unusual to see a car in this class with a grille like Valhalla has.

CDN: How did CMF feature in the car’s design and engineering goals?

MR: From the outset the Valhalla was going to be a carbon tub with a carbon exterior. So as a designer, the first thing I want to do is expose all the carbon. I've recently walked down the factory line and we've got a myriad of all-carbon cars with tints over them. 

Then we went into the interior and we said, “Well, if you look at a Formula One car, there are a myriad of carbon finishes; larger weaves, checkerboard weaves, some chopped strand.” We wanted to think more about how to use carbon in terms of the visual language, while offering the customer variation.

CDN: Does this feed into 50% of Valhalla buyers using your Q bespoke division?

MR: Part of our world is Q by Aston Martin. Of all the cars that have already gone out, I don’t think two are the same. From the very beginning we thought about coloration and our three layering of the body really helps. You can decide to have a satin upper, a gloss body and a gloss lower. You can flip that around or you can have them all the same. 

It was really about allowing our customers a canvas, because we know from Valkyrie that when we get into this area, buyers want to have something special. They want to do their own individual thing. There are numerous liveries that we put forward and some amazing colour combinations that you would not think would work – some not typically ‘Aston Martin’. This is a car that can cope with a variation of colour as well. You've got to engineer it all, you've got to make it all feasible. 

From the very beginning, this was about creating a heavily Q-contented car.