Gallery: Sensible, Creative and Sublime: Our Favorites From the 2012 Geneva Motor Show
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GENEVA — Understated is not the word to describe an international auto show that witnessed the introduction of [the most ferocious Ferrari ever](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/ferrari-f12berlinetta-debut/) and an [ostentatious Bentley SUV](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/bentley-exp-95-suv/) rolling on 23-inch rims. But the 2012 Geneva Motor Show certainly felt understated. For all the outlandish supercars and concepts on the show floor, there were many quiet, thoughtful ideas for making good, efficient cars. Easing our reliance on fossil fuels is an incredibly tough nut to crack. While hybrids and electrics undoubtedly will play a growing role in the equation, the Geneva Motor Show was all about a holistic approach to sustainable motoring: Efficient engines driving lightweight, uber-aerodynamic vehicles. Well, that and supercars. Geneva being Geneva, no show is complete without the glorious irreverence, if not irrelevance, of a 700-plus horsepower carbon-fiber wedge designed to carry no more than two people at absolutely eyeball-compressing speed. With that in mind, here’s a look at the sensible superminis, creative concepts and sublime supercars of the 2012 Geneva Motor Show. Fiat 500L --------- The Fiat 500L highlights the issues inherent in building a sub-brand around a single iconic car — or, in this case, the reimagining of a single iconic car. The 500L is a five-door hatchback with the proportions of a minivan and the [Fiat 500](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/fiat-500/)’s smiling face and cute headlights. This thing looks big enough to carry an original [Fiat 500](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/reviews/2011/02/fiat-500/all/1). But if Mini can get away with building [cars that are anything but mini](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2010/11/10-cars-you-can-bet-will-be-classics/?pid=377), Fiat should have no problem building a family-size 500. Good news: The 500L will have the option of a tiny two-cylinder [TwinAir turbo engine](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2010/07/fiat-500-twinair/), which hews more closely to the original’s character than, say, a 1.3-liter diesel. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
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Infiniti Emerg-E ---------------- Infiniti has been showcasing fabulous concept cars for several years, and the hybrid two-seater [Emerg-E](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/infiniti-emerg-e-ev/) continues the trend. With styling that mimics the spaceships of *Star Wars Episode I*, the Emerg-E is a 400-horsepower sports car with a twist. Although the engine is mounted amidships, it doesn’t drive the wheels. It drives a generator. The Emerg-E is a range-extended electric vehicle akin to the [Chevrolet Volt](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/reviews/2011/04/chevy-volt/all/1). When the lithium-iron phosphate battery runs down after 30 miles, the 1.2-liter three-cylinder engine-generator keeps the juice flowing. It would be quite wonderful if we could actually buy cars like this, but we’d settle for seeing the styling of the Emerg-E and other recent Infiniti concepts carried over to the automaker’s line of slightly discordant production cars. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Infiniti-Emerg-E-041.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Smart For-Us ------------ Who would have thought, way back when Smart wasn’t a Daimler brand but a single, radically small car called the ForTwo, the company might one day build a pickup? Of course, this being Smart, it’s not a *big* pickup truck. The For-Us is tiny, and electric to boot, with a 75-horsepower electric motor. It’s significantly bigger than a ForTwo, and strange. It looks a bit like a Rinspeed concept with its wild primary colors, its Euro-decadent looks and its hyper-specific use scenario: The bed features racks for two bicycles. Hybrid bicycles, of course, that charge while you drive. What the For-Us also shows is that it is perhaps no accident that pickup trucks are generally not skinned with shiny white plastic. The man with the mop in the photo was dusting the damn thing constantly. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Smart-For-Us.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Suzuki G70 ---------- A year or two ago, a small, bubbly car rolling into Geneva with a fluorescent green paint job almost certainly would have been electric. Not in 2012, though, when the focus was squarely on making cars more efficient by honing current technology. Like [the Ford B-Max](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/ford-b-max/) or [the Toyota GT 86](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/toyota-gt-86/), the Suzuki G70 refines the Japanese compacts of the 1980s. In that way, everything old is new again as low weight (1,600 pounds), a small engine (a 660cc three-cylinders) and great aerodynamics converge. Bonus points for the partial skirts over the rear wheels. Slap some Moon Disc wheel covers on there and call it done. What’s even better is that the G70, or something like it, may actually be produced. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
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Range Rover Evoque Convertible ------------------------------ And now for [something completely different](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/underwire/tag/monty-python/). Range Rover already sells the Evoque, its answer to the troubling question of what the bastard child of an SUV and a sports coupé might look like. Having followed the likes of BMW into that swamp, the same folks who brought us the amazing [Land Rover Defender](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2011/11/land-rover-dilutes-the-iconic-defender/) now wonder what the bastard child of an SUV and a sports convertible might look like. Now we know. It makes us wonder what Charles Spencer King, who always regretted that his beloved [Range Rover became a toy for the rich](http://usat.ly/A8pFBR), would think of this nonsense. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
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Gumpert Apollo Enraged ---------------------- Without Roland Gumpert, we would have only beautiful supercars. Gumpert, who once ran Audi’s superlative rally team, founded his own boutique automaker in 2004. He’s been building increasingly bonkers versions of the Apollo ever since. Each uses Audi engines and Audi components, and they’re all barely road-legal race cars that will rip your face off. They also are sinfully, unnervingly and almost evangelically ugly. This is not necessarily bad. Especially when you name your 780-horsepower featherweight monstrosity after the Greek god of poetry and music. Better yet, the giant snorkel feeding air to the supercharged 4.2-liter V8 is labeled “pure German speed” in all caps. It’s awesome. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Gumpert-Apollo.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Red Bull-Renault RB7 -------------------- [Renault is the brave and committed car company](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2011/06/qa-with-carlos-ghosn/) that’s actually mass producing an electric car, the Zoe, even as its corporate sister continues cranking out the [Nissan Leaf](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/reviews/2010/12/road-test-seeing-green-in-new-way-with-nissan-leaf/). These cars are complimented by a range of hybrids, including the Renault-powered Red Bull RB7 that won the 2011 Formula One World Championship. Modern F1 cars feature a [kinetic energy recovery system](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/kinetic-energy-recovery-system-kers/) that stores the energy generated by braking and uses it to provide an extra 80 horsepower at key moments during each lap. This car, by the way, is the real deal -- a tiny sticker bearing its chassis number identified the car as the one that carried Mark Webber to his final victory of the season. No, there’s nothing new about this [Red Bull F1 car](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2011/05/red-bull-turns-to-nissan-for-electric-help/), but F1 cars are always cool, so we’re including it. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
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Volkswagen Cross Coupé TDI -------------------------- This handsome concept from Volkswagen is an updated version of the Cross Coupé shown last fall in Tokyo. It ditches the gasoline engine for a turbodiesel augmented by two electric motors. The plug-in hybrid is said to get 131 mpg. Volkwagen is famous for teasing us with cool diesel hybrids — remember the [Golf diesel hybrid](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2008/03/vws-golf-diesel/)? The [wildly futuristic XL1](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/volkswagen-xl1/)? -- and frankly it’s getting tiresome. But hope springs eternal, and we will say that the drivetrain is realistic enough that it could see production. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
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Extrapolating from current trends here at Geneva, the mid-term future will bring us three kinds of cars. The first is [supercars](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/exotics/) and [super-SUVs](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/bentley-exp-95-suv/) for people with [silly amounts of money](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/reasons-to-make-silly-amounts-of-money/). The second is simple lightweight, reasonably powered sports cars for people with a passion for driving. The third is [autonomous pods](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/magazine/2012/01/ff_autonomouscars/all/1) that will handle the majority of soul-crushing, mind-numbing commuting we do each day. The Toyota Diji is one of the pods. The future this car envisions is still too far off for the car to have any basis in reality, and Toyota excels at cheerful design studies like this. This car's parlor trick is interior *and*exterior LED screens that can display pretty much anything you like. “The entire body will be used as a display area,” Toyota says, “with body color and content changeable at will.” This being 2012, the Diji can of course be controlled via your smartphone, letting you do anything but drive as your robo-car takes you home, where you might hop into a proper car like the [Toyota GT 86](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/toyota-gt-86/) and enjoys some real driving. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Toyota-Diji.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Audi A1 2.0 T Quattro --------------------- Audi has not wanted for gorgeous cars lately, but it is still a surprise to see an automaker known for sedans and coupés build a small car this attractive. The regular A1 is no slouch, mind you, but the very-limited-edition 2.0 Quattro is simply magnificent. It’s certainly helped by the black-white-red color scheme and the specs: 252 horsepower in a car that weighs barely more than 3,000 pounds. Unfortunately, production will be limited to 333 examples. Think of it more as an inspiration for the color scheme on your next Audi: In a booth which included several models of their sublime R8 supercar, the A1 Quattro drew the most looks. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Audi-Quattro-2.0.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Lamborghini Aventador J ----------------------- Back when [Lamborghini](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/tag/lamborghini/) was still an upstart startup, test driver Bob Wallace defied company founder Ferruccio Lamborghini’s rule against building race cars. He used a Muria as the foundation for the Jota, but it was never produced. You can’t even go to Lamborghini’s museum in Italy and see it, because it burned to the ground two years later. The [Lamborghini](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2011/05/lamborghini-aventador-review/) Aventador J is a perfect, if cruel, reimagining of the Jota. It is a wildly modified but otherwise ordinary Aventador -- if the word *ordinary* could ever apply to a 700-horsepower wedge of anger -- built for a wildly wealthy customer who will almost certainly tuck it away in his garage, never to be seen again. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com* [](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/03/Lamborghini-Aventador-J.jpg) *Photo: Newspress*
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Honda NSX --------- The original Acura NSX was a revelation when it appeared in 1990, a fast, functional supercar that proved Japan could run with the Italians and Germans. It showed an automaker can be redefined by a single car. The [Honda NSX Concept](http://stag-komodo.wired.com/autopia/2012/03/honda-nsx/) is, at the moment, little more than a wedge of hope, It doesn’t even have an engine, let alone an interior, and its hybrid-electric drivetrain is little more than hype. But it’s hope Honda might remember where it came from and what it is capable of, and that it might build something amazing again. *Photo: Peter Orosz/Wired.com*
