Tales from Bavaria

Buckley’s criticism of the styling of today’s BMWS struck a chord with me( Backfire, March). I feel the Bavarian marque lost its way after signing off Chris Bangle’s E65 7 Series (above), its grotesque bootlid later known as the ‘Bangle Butt’. His design for the E85 Z4 was equally bizarre, the odd shape suggesting a cleaner had knocked the model off its perch one evening, squashing the rear, then returned it hoping nobody would notice.

Since Bangle’s departure it seems as if BMW, with each generation of new car, has endeavoured to distance itself from the American stylist’s design language. And because radical changes are considered risky in today’s market, the firm offers instead – oversized kidneys aside – little more than the perpetuation of mediocrity.

The Germans have a word that perfectly describes current BMW design: verschlimmbessern, which translates as ‘making something worse in the process of fixing it’. Andrew D Graham

Hohenpolding, Bavaria