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The Lotus Theory 1 Is Exactly What a Concept Should Be: Radical

Lotus Theory 1 supercar concept with its doors open.
Lotus Theory 1 supercar concept with its doors open.

If you glance at the new Lotus Theory 1 concept from the side, you could almost mistake it for an old-school, wedge-shaped supercar from the British brand’s James Bond era, but its uniqueness becomes apparent as you orbit the design. Opening the enormous spaceship-wing doors reveals a cockpit with some radical new ideas for how a driver and passengers might interface with a car.

I don’t think anything resembling this will make it to production, but Lotus has trotted out some funky ideas with the Theory 1 that are worth talking about. There’s some real creativity on display here, and that’s exactly what concept cars should be about—especially ones from a moonshot outfit like Lotus.

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The body broadly follows the prompts of quintessential supercars, and a few of its visual elements look familiar, but the whole package feels fresh. In particular, Lotus’ people did a great job reconciling sharp edges in the spitters and skirts with smooth shapes over the wheels and around the cockpit.

Inside, the design goes ultra-futuristic minimalist with an almost organic, as in biological, look. These pictures make me think of a Star Trek episode called “Tin Man” where the characters encounter a spaceship that’s actually a living being. The pilot’s seat grows out of the floor and it communicates with its driver through telepathy. Shoutout to my fellow nerds who know what I’m talking about. For everybody else, we can get back to the car, though the sci-fi similarities continue with the Theory 1’s human-machine interface.

Utilizing a concept cooked up by MotorSkins, a wearable tech company, Lotus envisions car-and-driver interactions like a piece of the steering wheel that pulses to indicate GPS guidance. The seat comes right up out of the monocoque—deeply impractical (too short? Too bad!), but super cool looking. The company has branded this idea “LOTUSWEAR.” If my Star Trek comparison didn’t land, the press release explains it as an “adaptive soft and lightweight robotic textile material, seamlessly enabling the car to communicate with the driver and passengers and offer a more intuitive and comfortable in-car experience. It aims to do this through inflatable pods on the seating and steering wheel that will react in real-time to offer more support, grip, and subtle prompts via personalized haptic feedback.”

Practically speaking, I’m skeptical of this. I’ll stick with turn-signal stalks and a phone suction-cupped to my windshield. At the same time, I love that somebody’s pitching new concepts for car controls.

Lotus is also trotting out an idea for deep auditory personalization, suggesting that the company could use special headrest speakers to give its vehicles different noise profiles—not just for drivers, but for everybody in the car, individually. Again, I’m lukewarm on all the interior-only synthetic vehicle noise experiences I’ve had so far. But, if we’re already supposing a future where our cars communicate with us via robo-fabric, by then they might just have the sound stuff sorted.

One modern aspect I do like here is that while the main display screen is large, it’s also fairly well tucked into the dashboard. The idea of a sub-screen in the middle of the steering unit is interesting, too. Looks like Lotus is imagining that centerpiece keeping static while the square, yoke-like steering control turns around it, like how the new Bugatti Tourbillon’s wheel operates.

I’m a big fan of Theory 1’s exterior look, three-pax center-driver cockpit layout, and the overall reduction in materials. The “fewer parts” philosophy behind this feels like a far-flung interpretation of Lotus’ original “simplify and add lightness” ethos. The brand has also published a list of stats for the car, but they’re kind of arbitrary, since it’s a non-running concept. This is a little like reading the stats of a fictional spaceship on a TV show, but since we brought up Star Trek earlier, I guess we can also discuss Lotus’ dreams for the Theory 1.

The all-wheel-drive supercar, if it were real, would pack a 70-kWh battery, put out just north of 980 horsepower, zoom to 62 mph in under 2.5 seconds, have a top speed of just under 200 mph, and offer a combined driving range of 250 miles. The weight of this theoretical car, made of recycled carbon fiber, cellulose composite, and polycarbonate, is about 3,500 pounds.

The futuristic minimalism showcased in the Theory 1 probably won’t make it to reality at scale, but some of the general ideas might. Mainly, it’s just fun to see a new concept that genuinely aims for the moon and bundles a bunch of wild ideas into one otherworldly vehicle. Plus, who doesn’t love a good wedge on wheels?

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