Walter de Silva: "The Audi A5 Coupé is the Most Beautiful Car I've Ever Designed"

INGOLSTADT, GERMANY – November 3, 2009: The German Design Council has announced it will present a 2010 Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany to the Audi A5 Coupé – and the vehicle’s creator is elated. In the eyes of Walter de Silva, Head of Design for the Volkswagen Group since 2007 and previously Head of Audi Design, one thing is certain: “The Audi A5 Coupé is the most beautiful car I’ve ever designed and is well on its way to becoming a design icon. I’m therefore thrilled by this accolade, as it also validates my hard work.” This most prestigious of all official design awards in Germany will be presented as part of the opening ceremony of the International Ambiente Fair in Frankfurt on February 12, 2010.

The Audi A5 Coupé continues the tradition of the classic two-door sport/touring coupé: executed powerfully and boldly via elements of Audi’s progressive design language. Coupe customers are guided largely by their emotions when they buy a new car – and design is the most important factor regarding a sporty two-door car.

The Audi A5 needs just one glance to win these customers over. “The A5 Coupé clearly has an automotive personality all its own. It is an absolute highlight of Audi’s progressive and stylish design language,” asserts de Silva.

For the Italian designer, the award-winning A5 Coupé is a truly important vehicle altogether: It handsomely distills and blends core elements of the Audi brand’s genetic code: sportiness, power, sophistication, and elegance. The low and sporty silhouette, the few but very precisely drawn lines, the expressive front end, and the equally distinctive tail end comprise a wholly desirable coupe.”

De Silva adds: “The A5 is naturally a very powerful and supremely sporty automobile. Yet it isn’t the least bit aggressive or arrogant.” De Silva also feels that its classic elegance and a harmony of proportions, lines and surfaces sets this Audi two-door model apart.

The A5 Coupé’s proportions are characterized by a very wide and low stance, a long wheelbase with a short front overhang and a long, flowing transition from the C-pillar to the short rear. “It’s especially the way the shoulder line extends, with the back roof pillar flowing into it and the long transition to the short rear, which renders the A5 a typical grand tourer – a sophisticated touring sports car,” explains Walter de Silva.

Customers have certainly acknowledged the A5’s remarkable design. Audi sold some 112,000 units of the A5 Coupé worldwide between its launch in June 2007 and late September 2009. The largest markets are Germany, the United States, Great Britain, France, and Italy.