It's a pity the cover of this book shows one of Colani's sports cars. It's great and all but it's easily the least interesting thing he's done. What would have been better would have been the gigantic flying boat that looks like a swan or the astonishing--almost erotic--concept airliner for the Japanese airline with four petal-shaped wings and an indescribable fuselage. Then there's the wonderfully bizarre railway locomotive. Colani's designs are among the most radical and imaginative...and beautiful...ever.
What's strange is that he isn't better known and that this is really the first book to cover his work with any thoroughness. Colani is inspired by natural biological forms. To him nature is infinitely complex, provides infinite solutions, and has barely been tapped as a pragmatic design source by man. Nothing superficial--no mere mimicry--he points out the multifunctionality of many of these complex forms he adopts. He also points the way to a future design world that lives and breathes with the natural world. Designers of Green architecture are just now barely intersecting with his vision. More importantly, Colani insists that the right solutions, the healthy solutions, will invariably (as in nature) be beautiful. Too many ecologically-minded designers seem to wear the hair shirt and demand that of others too.
This book should appeal to those who feel technology is not some dysfunctional thing but a yearning to consciously merge with nature. It should appeal to those who love the most outlandish design work. It should appeal to sensualists and lovers of beautiful objects.
I can't imagine being interested in design and not owning this wonderful, beautifully illustrated, well-written, and comprehensive book on perhaps the most visionary designer of the last century. Colani's work makes virtually every other attempt at design look wooden and two-dimensional. History (and we) will eventually catch up with this man.
