Not too long ago, Vicki Vlachakis, a slender, 34-year-old beach blonde from Southern California, was at a Saturn dealership trying to buy its new roadster, the Sky.
“I went in there to pick one up and, you know, they want to tell you all about the car, and I’m like ‘Wait, you don’t have to sell me, I actually worked on the car!’ I got to know every millimeter of the car. I know the story of every piece.”
She did go home with one – without a discount – but only after enduring the dealer’s spiel. “I tell them that I worked on it, but they don’t get the extent: working with all the drawing and all the manufacturing.”
Vlachakis is part of GM’s Southern California-based Advance Design Studio, an elite group that lays out the company’s newest models a safe 2,300 miles from her bosses’ office.
If GM is going to stage a turnaround, hold off hard- charging Toyota and wean Americans off of European styling, a lot of the energy for the growth will come from Vlachakis and her fellow designers.
Vlachakis would appear to be the perfect designer to lead such a charge. She cut her car- designing teeth working for Audi and Mercedes- Benz in Germany, and the clean, curvy designs of the Sky and Pontiac Solstice – the interior of which she also designed – speak to those years abroad.
The Sky and Solstice harken back to the classic European two-seaters regaining popularity today. “It’s so cool,” she says. “I’ve always loved the roadsters and am lucky enough to work on them.”
After several years working in Europe, GM recruited Vlachakis in 2000. She was all of 27 years old.
Vlachakis specializes in interior design. Her biggest splash so far will be at this week’s New York International Auto Show, which opens at the Javits Center this Thursday, as it will mark the first time the redesigned Saturn line-up, inspired by Vlachakis’ 2-year-old Sky re-do, will appear together.
Ironically, Vlachakis, a New York Auto Show regular, finds herself too busy to attend her big coming-out year.
“It’s neat to see how it set the tone for the rest, but honestly all of it was evolving at the same time,” she says. “The Sky just came out first.”
One thing she can’t take credit for is Saturn’s line of goofy astronomy names.
“I gave them [some possible names], but they never listen to me!” she says, laughing. She can’t remember her suggestions, but admits they were also celestial. “Maybe it’s better that I stick to designing.”