Mazda’s First Electric Vehicle, The MX-30

We speak with chief designer Yoichi Matsuda about the brand's first EV

One of the first cars Yoichi Matsuda (chief designer at Mazda) owned was a 1991 MX-5 Miata. He joined the brand just a year before, in 1990, and shortly after, the Miata hit the Japanese market—then the world. And Matsuda has been with Mazda ever since—an incredibly long career as a designer in the car world. We met with him at the Tokyo Motor Show, …

Nest LivingHome Toolkit Drastically Reduces Costs of Housing Construction

Starting at $57,900, Plant Prefab and architecture firm Brooks & Scarpa offer modular unit designs that can be assembled with prefabricated, customizable parts—from shelters that house hundreds of people to standalone units that run off the grid. These designs, named Nest LivingHome Toolkits, seek to combat the housing crisis in many US cities by employing innovative design in situations that usually require costly construction sites …

Nissan’s Future-Focused Ariya and IMk Concept Cars

A pair of electric vehicles previewed at the Tokyo Motor Show signal a new direction for the company

In the past, Giovanny Arroba assisted in designing cars as totemic for Nissan as the Altima. Today, he’s a program design director at Nissan, and admits he’s experiencing a pretty special rebirth. Speaking with us at the Tokyo Motor Show about Nissan’s new electric Ariya and (sadly, Japan-market-only) IMk Concepts, he says this sector, for carmakers, feels tremendously freeing. For instance, he says the Ariya …