Larry Shinoda’s Remarkable Legacy

He was asked to leave Art Center College before his graduation because he had decided that he could submit his assignments without actually attending class. He worked on the stillborn 1957s at Packard before realizing that the future might in fact be brighter elsewhere. Not exactly life events which would seem to form the basis of an outstanding resume.

Neither, probably, were the effects of enduring two years of forced resettlement in the Manzanar War Relocation Center internment camp along with 10,000 other Japanese- and American-born citizens during the dark days of Executive Order 9066. (For a sobering first-person account of that period in American history, I recommend reading George Takei’s They Called Us Enemy.)

 

Despite those early trials, and the lingering anti-Japanese sentiment characteristic of the Detroit auto industry at the time, Lawrence K. (“Larry”) Shinoda would ultimately be acclaimed as the designer responsible for the split-window 1963 Corvette Sting Ray and, after moving to Ford with his patron Semon E. “Bunkie” Knudsen, the 1969 Ford Mustang Boss 302. According to popular accounts, he was somewhat of a self-promoter, always sure of his considerable talent and always ready to challenge the status quo, even if it meant ruffling feathers in the executive suite. Let’s take a closer look at some of his more iconic contributions to the art of automobile design.

Beginning with a late-1956 move to General Motors, Shinoda finished brief stints in the Chevrolet and Pontiac studios and then was asked to work with “special styling projects” there, partially due to the result of an impromptu stoplight drag race in which, driving his heavily-modified ’55 Ford sedan, he handily beat GM Design chief Bill Mitchell’s supercharged Pontiac. He had involvement with a number of the automaker’s racing and concept cars such as CERV (Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle) I and II during the late 1950s and early 1960s.

 

One of Shinoda’s special styling projects was Mitchell’s own Sting Ray race car, which led to his association with legendary Corvette engineer Zora Arkus-Duntov and an eventual assignment as lead designer for the production 1963 Corvette Sting Ray, then as now an icon of American automobile design.

 

Shinoda was also largely responsible for GM’s Mako Shark I and II concept cars, which also became the subject of an oft-repeated GM Styling anecdote: One of the outsized objets d’art in Design VP Bill Mitchells’ office was a handsomely mounted mako shark, souvenir of a previous deep-sea fishing expedition. During the development of the eponymous concept car, Mitchell requested that the car be finished identically to the fish, its blue-grey color fading into silver towards the dorsal side (i.e., the rocker panels).

Apparently several unsuccessful refinishing attempts were made. Eventually, while Mitchell was away on a business trip, designers elected to instead repaint the mounted mako shark to match the concept car. On his return, and unaware of the hi-jinks, Mitchell reportedly exclaimed “That’s exactly what I wanted!” There’s no confirmation that Larry Shinoda was the one who instigated that episode, but it’s not too far-fetched to think that he might at least have been one of the miscreants involved.

 

The Mako Shark II, also enthusiastically received on the auto-show circuit, became the inspiration for the 1968 “C3” (third-generation) Corvette, which enjoyed the distinction of being the longest-produced version of Chevrolet’s sports car.

 

When Knudsen resigned from GM in early 1968, becoming Ford Motor Company’s president, he brought Larry Shinoda with him, and Shinoda wasted no time cleaning up the design details of the SR2, a Mustang proposal intended by Ford as a showroom-floor rival to the Camaro Z-28.

In a later interview, Shinoda noted that the SR2 “…was going to be more garish than the Mach 1. They had a big grille across the back and a great big gas cap and fake cast exhaust outlets and big hood pins and a really big side scoop. I took all that off, went to the C-stripe decal and painted out the hood, did the rear spoiler and window shade and the front air dam.”

 

Just before being fired from Ford (after Knudsen’s own dismissal), Shinoda lent his design talent to the King Cobra, an aerodynamically-enhanced version of Ford’s mid-size Torino intended to battle the Dodge Daytona and Plymouth Superbird in stock-car competition, replacing the previous Torino Talladega. Powered by Ford’s 429 V8, three prototypes were built before NASCAR rules changes effectively killed the program.

 

In all fairness, it must also be said that Larry Shinoda was also the lead designer responsible for the larger and less iconic Mustangs of model years 1971 through 1973.

 

After leaving Ford, Knudsen founded Rectrans Inc., a recreational-vehicle company. Again Shinoda followed him, designing a series of motor homes which were marketed by Rectrans for a few years in the early 1970s.

 

When Rectrans was purchased by heavy-truck manufacturer White Motor Company, Knudsen was named president and Shinoda became White’s design VP. Later on, he established Shinoda Design Associates, an independent design firm, counting clients as diverse as Monaco Coach, Nippon Paint, and Jeep (the ’93 Grand Cherokee SUV, a design for which he only belatedly received credit).

 

Oh, yes – and one more automotive client: Volvo. (You didn’t think I’d be able to pen nearly 1,000 words without a single Volvo reference, right?). In 1993, with memories of the recently-discontinued 780 fresh in our collective corporate memory, Volvo Cars of North America connected with Shinoda Design Associates to develop idea sketches for a new two-passenger sports car.

 

Whichever party made the initial contact is lost to history, and the effort never became a serious project, but at least we’re left with a trio of Volvo concept sketches with the SDA imprint, proof that Larry Shinoda devoted a small portion of his considerable design talent to Volvo more than thirty years ago. Who would have guessed?