Q&A

IAN CALLUM, DESIGN DIRECTOR, JAGUAR

Is it more difficult to design a smaller car?

“Yes, especially with the Jaguar psyche of the car being low and having length. It’s not a character of speed and motion here, its attitude. I wanted the E-pace to have its own character, with features like the chamfered corners. I knew we’d have longer overhangs with this, but that’s not in our psyche. I enjoy problem-solving: some designers say they can’t do it because the overhangs would be too long. I embrace it, as it gives a character of its own and the car is better for it.”

Can small SUVS end up looking the same due to packaging requirements? “They are homogenised. We learned from making the F-pace that the most important consideration is practicality, not to be able to rush around the race track. You sit high in an SUV; people enjoy that, so the priorities are different. You do then tend to end up with a generic car and shape with the measurements, but we didn’t want to have generic looks. People should buy a car for looks. We’ve got a racy roofline, but there are adequate dimensions.”

How long has the E-pace been in development?

“Three-and-a-half years, with the idea around for longer. We made a model and within months it was in the [product plan]. It hit the spot from the beginning, from bosses here and at Tata in India. This started as an idea before it took off and, while we’ve been working on it, the segment has taken off. We’re in the right place at the right time.”

Was there a nervousness about Jaguar making a frontwheel-drive car again?

“The essence of it has been to make an SUV, not a transverse Jaguar. This was the architecture available to us. As with the F-pace, we determined the packaging of the car from scratch. It’s flexible enough to have whatever size we wanted, such as with the wheelbase. We wanted a bigger wheelbase than Land Rover; we knew we could make it work.”

Did you design the three SUVS alongside each other?

“We started with the F-pace, did the I-pace next, and then this. Confidence is very important: after getting the reaction we did to the F-pace, we felt we could stretch the boundaries and we understood the issues around making a pragmatic car. With the E-pace, we knew we couldn’t do a mini F-pace – we needed to give it its own character. We need to get people into it because they like it – the brand comes next.”

Has Jaguar been held back from making cars like this in the past?

“The I-pace is a more transformative car, but this will do more to the brand. Were we held back a bit before? Possibly, yes. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was. I rebelled against it, and then I rebelled against an SUV. I was obsessed with us being a performance and sports car maker. The F-type [pictured, left] gave me that freedom of thought; I felt held back by the thought of doing an SUV prior to doing a sports car. Once the F-type was out there, the F-pace became logical. The F-pace came out at the right time. This is coming out at the right time. We have fixed the basics first – this was not an indulgence but a necessity.”