Cupra’s Tindaya idea goals to polarise – similar to its life-style equipment to match

How far ought to a automotive model go? That’s the query that underpins the technique adopted by Cupra, the VW Group’s wayward, edgy Spanish model. As soon as a sub-brand of Seat, the car-maker struck out by itself, setting itself up as essentially the most emotional EV model accessible, with premium positioning and an emphasis on driving and intentionally polarising design.

On the IAA Mobility 2025 present in Munich, Cupra made an enormous splash. Constructing on the Home of Cupra narrative it launched at this yr’s Milan Design Week, the model confirmed off its new baggage vary developed with Harper Collective, the 3D-printed footwear created in partnership with Zellerfeld, in addition to a brand new fizzy drink and even a Cupra scent.

All this exercise underscored the model’s ambition to go ‘Past Automotive’, but on the identical time it’s explicitly aligning itself with those that want to drive themselves and haven’t any truck with the anodyne expertise of many EVs, not to mention the obvious rise of autonomous techniques.

To this finish, Cupra’s model movie states baldly, ‘No Drivers, No Cupra’, with a ponderously intoned checklist of different nice issues that will be banished from trendy life if such a binary method had been taken.

Becoming a member of the merch was a brand new idea, the Cupra Tindaya, the corporate’s largest automotive so far, with a range-extender powertrain (not an EV or plug-in hybrid) and a powerful signifier of future intentions. These embrace a acknowledged want to enter the Center East market, becoming a member of the 50-plus nations during which Cupra already has a presence.

In amongst all of the moodily lit geology, neon-tinged graphics, and whizzy animations, the movie is principally Cupra making a stab, like many earlier than it, at this technology’s equal of the Apple ‘1984’ or Guinness ‘Surfer’ commercials, a bit bit avant-garde, a bit bit iconoclastic. For essentially the most half, the truth is a bit more prosaic.

Automobiles just like the Formentor and Born are completely serviceable examples of mainstream gothic, with moody colors and supplies and lighting and bodywork that slides and sweeps round provocatively to tell apart itself from the extra prosaic iterations of the identical platform introduced by its VW Group siblings.

Cecilia Taieb, Cupra’s world head of communications, is entrance and centre of those strikes. A dynamic presence who operates within the coronary heart of the corporate, Taieb is adamant that Cupra’s collaborations are usually not about profitable pals, however about making certain the Cupra vibe is distinctive to all. ‘Take the drink,’ she says of the fizzy concoction of ginger and lime developed with Vichy Catalan, ‘you both find it irresistible otherwise you hate it – it’s very polarising, like our vehicles.’

There’s additionally a brand new Cupra scent, created with the assistance of the Fundación Ernesto Ventós and Lucta, a perfume specialist, each primarily based in Barcelona only a brief distance from Cupra’s HQ. ‘We’re an emotional model,’ Taieb says, ‘so we use all of the senses.’ Designed to be deployed in Cupra retail environments and the vehicles themselves, the scent aligns itself with the Cupra imaginative and prescient – not avant-garde, precisely, however self-consciously other than the mainstream.

All tie-ins must be linked to the vehicles. ‘They’re our essence,’ Taieb confirms, ‘however a very powerful factor for a model is have a character.’ When discussing the ‘Cupra Tribe’, a time period for homeowners, followers and admirers of this method, Taieb notes that ‘many individuals in it don’t also have a driving licence – they’re our new technology.’ She reiterates the 2 values that Cupra strives to foreground, no matter whether or not it’s vehicles, clothes, suitcases or extra. ‘Design and efficiency are our two huge issues – it’s important to be attracted to 1 or the opposite.’

Taieb can be emphatic that there isn’t a ‘Cupra model’ of the whole lot. ‘It’s when it feels proper’, she confirms. Launched to the workforce behind Harper Collective baggage by none apart from erstwhile Wallpaper* editor Tony Chambers, she knew immediately there was a synergy. ‘Their design and values are coherent to us,’ she says, ‘they’re not an enormous model, they take plastic from the ocean and switch it into suitcases.’ Including that ‘the whole lot within the assortment wants to inform a narrative and be polarising,’ Taieb and her small workforce, which incorporates Ignasi Prieto, the corporate’s chief model officer, may be agile and modern.

What Cupra is or isn’t may also be up for grabs. ‘We don’t have a legacy that helps us,’ Taieb says. ‘I can’t have a look at the previous as a result of we don’t have a previous. We’re the newcomers within the VW Group.’ Whereas direct synergies are usually not sought, they’re not averted both.

The Raval would be the first Cupra mannequin to characteristic 3D-knitting know-how within the inside, in a fabric that can be deployed within the upcoming Tribe editions of the present manufacturing line-up. The thought is to create 3D-knitted sports activities gear in a future assortment. Utilizing processes in automotive design and manufacturing for merchandise like footwear and suitcases is one other manner of selling the supplies themselves.

Cupra is nothing if not bold. Within the seven years because it was based, in 2018, it has produced seven vehicles, with the newest, the brand new Raval EV, given satisfaction of place on the large Cupra stand erected within the Seventeenth-century Kaiserhof courtyard of the Munich Residenz palace. Regardless of the camouflage physique panels, the crisp traces of the bodywork had been clear, setting the model other than same-platform siblings from VW and Škoda.

Becoming a member of the Tindaya and Raval had been a clutch of particular ‘Cupra Tribe’ editions of the present core line-up, the Formentor, Leon, Leon Sportstourer, and Terramar. Along with 3D-knitted textile, the vehicles characteristic a brand new Manganese Matt exterior paint end, together with bio-based paint on some distinguished inside components. ‘They present that Cupra goes past the automotive,’ Taeib says, declaring the synergies between colors and supplies and the merchandise supplied by the Home of Cupra. ‘Our clothes vary matches the colors of our vehicles,’ she says, ‘you’ll by no means see a pink T-shirt or a white hoodie.’

Surprisingly, Cupra has eschewed simple targets in its advertising. In response to Taeib, the model isn’t particularly household oriented, preferring to deal with a younger, city demographic who nonetheless see worth and pleasure in driving. In addition to sponsoring FC Barcelona, Cupra additionally places its identify to Padel, the racquet sport. ‘It’s a bit unconventional, city and young-minded,’ says Taeib, including that discovering the appropriate companions and causes is ‘not about targets. If it matches, it matches – it’s like courting.’

The following day, Cupra’s head of design, Jorge Díez is readily available to debate the path showcased by the brand new Tindaya idea. With a reputation taken from a sacred volcanic mountain on Fuerteventura, the Tindaya is an angular, high-riding crossover.

At 4.72m, the Tindaya can be the most important Cupra so far, nudging itself into the full-size SUV section. Mild, shade, lighting, deep sculpture and materials contrasts form the physique, with its thrusting, spiky nostril and notched rear wheel arches with a deep cut-out within the flanks, clad in the identical materials used for the seat backs.

There are components of Lamborghini and even Lotus within the automotive’s stance and angle, and it conveys a specific amount of aggression. One individual’s aggression is one other’s ardour, and even emotion, so there’s a consistency of method to find it irresistible/hate it styling. Inside, 4 bucket seats are cantilevered off a central backbone, showing to drift above the ground.

A central jewel characteristic is used to change between three driving modes, Immersive, Meta and Rider. The primary is driver-focused, whereas the latter emphasises connectivity together with your environment and even your contact ebook. Whizzy animation and dynamic lighting all through the inside sign your selection. The yoke-style steering wheel is pitched someplace ‘between gaming and racing’, based on Díez, who factors out the 3D-knitted surfaces, neoprene seats and recycled supplies all through the cabin.

There’s an natural, barely trypophobic, floor detailing on the central backbone, with raised bumps and blended supplies that run the size of the inside. Díez additionally describes the outside in naturalistic phrases. ‘It’s extra like an animal,’ he says of the intersecting surfaces, ‘with twisting muscular tissues.’ Glass components are painted with a fade that reveals the small print beneath them, with Cupra’s signature copper serves as highlights on the sides of varieties and even via the lighting.

The latter performs a key position in defining the Tindaya’s id, particularly on start-up. The darkish grille beneath the nostril is definitely a display screen, which shows a swirling, fire-like animation when the automotive is turned on. ‘It’s just like the beast is waking up,’ says Díez, because the digital varieties transition and mirror the bodily LED lights above them. ‘It’s about how we are able to emphasise feelings,’ Díez continues, ‘we use sound, gentle, contact, style and odor – we goal all of the 5 senses.’

The Tindaya is the bravest assertion of intent from a model that persistently punches above its weight when it comes to ambition and attain. Cupra isn’t afraid to be an outlier – it relishes the ‘rebellious’ label – however as with all business concern, it’d nonetheless prefer to be an outlier in additional markets, with extra clients and a a lot greater tribe.