The Audi ZERØ EV Concept Looks Like An Alien’s Idea Of A Car
It’s hard not to miss the days when automakers pushed the boundaries of design and capabilities with futuristic concept cars — think the atomic energy-powered Ford Nucleon from 1958 or Chevy’s three rocket-like Astro concepts from the 1960s. However, designer Wini Camacho has given us an Audi concept that looks like something you’d see on a sci-fi show back in the 1950s: the Audi ZERØ.
The grey, brutalist electric vehicle is designed with mathematically led geometry. There is a spherical cabin, followed by four tubes that house wheel pods, creating a bold, simple design without the sharp or flowing aerodynamics of most modern concept cars. It’s meant to be an ultra-compact (it’s just 10 by 6 feet) one-seat vehicle that could be a coupe or a roadster — I mean, CØupe and RØadster — and there could even be performance-optimized track variations. The interior is just as stoic and minimalist, featuring an aluminum central hub with physical controls.
Is the Audi ZERØ getting produced?
Wini Camacho is a well-known automotive designer from the Philippines who designed for Mercedes-Benz for over three decades. Now, he has created a wide range of eye-popping vehicle concepts. This includes a metallic twin-bodied BMW roadster known as the BMW Z/Z and an impossibly round and adorable Fiat called the Topolino XS. All of these vehicles have remained design concepts, and there has been no confirmation that the Audi ZERØ will ever be more than a concept.
Automakers usually don’t turn their most extreme concept designs into real cars, and it’s more common to see some elements of the concept cars make their way into mass-produced vehicles, like the 2003 Audi Le Mans Quattro concept largely inspiring the design of the 2008 Audi R8 supercar. But some concepts have become reality, like the Audi TT, later discontinued so Audi could focus on EVs. Would Audi ever work with Wini Camacho on making the Audi ZERØ? It’s likely a bit too extreme, but nobody has shot it down publicly.
