DETROIT — Can a 33-year-old man from Sequim help save the American automobile industry?
Richard Duff, one of the youngest body designers at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, aims to do his part.
Duff designed the exterior of the 2010 Buick LaCrosse, General Motors’ answer to Lexus-level luxury sedans.
He was present at Sunday’s unveiling of the LaCrosse, which one critic has already said “could be the sales spark this ailing brand needs.”
This ride has “fresh style and international breeding,” according to Consumer Guide Auto at http://consumerguideauto.howstuffworks.com.
Duff, a 1993 graduate of Sequim High School, is plain thrilled to be in the middle of the gigantic exhibition of some 700 cars. The show, which opens to the public on Saturday, is expected to attract 700,000 people to Detroit’s Cobo Center before it closes on Jan. 25.
Duff grew up in Happy Valley, just south of Sequim. This is where he learned to love cars and driving and roads with voluptuous curves.
“I developed a passion for that time,” he said, “when it’s just you and the road, there’s time to think and listen to music.”
At GM, “I’m a spokesperson for people from states with curvy roads.”
His wheels have long been American: Duff’s parents, James and Judy Duff, ran a Ford Bronco parts business, so their son drove a Bronco as a teenager.
After high school, Duff went to Peninsula College, where professors such as Dan Underwood inspired him to pursue two degrees: one in engineering from Western Washington University and one in transportation design from the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif.
As influential, Duff said, was Underwood’s attitude about life. The economics professor taught him to challenge conventional thinking and to look for a way to learn from every experience.
Make it hip
Today, as a chief designer at GM, Duff has joined the drive to re-create the image of American automobiles. He is well aware that the Buick is considered a car for the older crowd.
So he and an assistant designer, Justin Thompson of Australia — another 33-year-old — set out to seduce drivers closer to their own age.
Duff’s challenge was to hip up classic Buick grace.
He liked the make’s traditional features: big chrome “waterfall” grill, portholes by the fenders, the line along the car’s flanks called a “sweepspear.” For the 2010 LaCrosse, Duff performed a subtle makeover.
He moved the portholes higher, spilled the waterfall grill onto the hood and gave the sweepspear an arch to kick it up over the rear wheel.
And working with a moldable clay car in GM’s test wind tunnel, he shaped the LaCrosse into a more aerodynamic vessel.
At the Detroit auto show, a pair of LaCrosses, one silver and one ruby red, are on display.
Duff said reaction to his design has been “overwhelmingly positive,” with journalists have been clamoring to photograph the LaCrosses.
Duff and his employer are under unusually hot lights this year in the wake of the Bush administration’s $17.4 billion loan aimed at rescuing GM and Chrysler from financial meltdown.
The American car industry’s future, like the rest of the U.S. economy, is loaded with unanswered questions.
But Duff, interviewed last week at the auto show, is filled with youthful optimism.
“GM has produced a lot of award-winning cars: the Saturn Aura, the Chevy Malibu,” he said. “There’s a lag in the public’s perception” of the company’s products.
Revitalization
“The way through this crisis in the auto industry is to design really amazing, competitive cars,” he said. “I feel like I’m part of that revitalization.”
The price of the 2010 LaCrosse is yet to be announced, but industry observers say it’s likely to be in the $25,000 to $35,000 range.
Duff believes there will always be a demand for sedans such as his Buick — and for sport-utility vehicles like the Chevy Tahoe — to tow the family boat to the lake or to cart the kids to soccer practice.
“The Tahoe is a fuel-efficient SUV. That doesn’t make headlines,” he said.
The Tahoe’s average of 16 to 20 miles per gallon probably won’t be big news as cars like the 50 mpg 2010 Toyota Prius come on the market.
So far that hybrid has been the superstar of the Detroit show. According to early reports, journalists were fighting to get near the display models.
The 2010 Buick LaCrosse, meanwhile, can go a little over 21 miles on a gallon of gas.
Sells in China
The Buick is the automaker’s best-selling car in China, Duff said. In 2007 some 337,000 were sold in the People’s Republic. GM unloaded about 115,000 Buicks in the United States that same year.
Duff has traveled twice to China, to accompany Buicks at the Shanghai Auto Show and just “to learn about China.”
“There’s a new way of thinking,” at GM, he said. “We need to design a car that will sell around the world, and that will appeal to everybody.”
A tall order. But Duff seems undaunted.
Still, living in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Mich., Duff misses Sequim now and then.
“Michigan is very flat. You drive in a straight line,” he said.
“What I wouldn’t give for a good volcano right now.”
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
