This is a scale model of the Hypervan, it’s one of Syd Mead’s best-known designs and that’s really saying something, as the full catalogue of his work is vast, and vastly influential.
Syd Mead is probably best-known for his set and vehicle design work on the seminal 1982 science fiction film Blade Runner directed by Ridley Scott and based on Philip K. Dick’s 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The film stars Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, and Daryl Hannah.
Above Video: This is a full-length interview with Syd Mead that runs over 42 minutes in length. The interview was done for the documentary “Closer Than We Think,” only a few minutes were used in the documentary due to time constraints so the director uploaded the full interview to YouTube due to its historic significance.
Some of Syd Mead’s other work included work on Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Blade Runner, Tron, 2010, Short Circuit, Aliens, Timecop, Johnny Mnemonic, Mission: Impossible III, Elysium, Tomorrowland, and Blade Runner 2049. George Lucas designed the AT-AT from Star Wars based on Syd Mead’s designs.
Over the course of his decades-long career, Mead would establish relationships with the likes of Sony, Minolta, Dentsu, Dyflex, Tiger Corporation, Seibu, Mitsukoshi, Bandai, NHK, and Honda, contributing industrial design work that strongly influenced the retrofuturistic design ethos that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s.
One aspect of Mead’s career that’s often overlooked is the extensive interior design work he did. Some of the most challenging was the interior design of private aircraft including the Boeing 747 that belonged to King Fah’d of the Royal House of Saudia Arabia. He also designed the interior of the 747 that belonged to the Royal House of Oman, and the 727 that belonged to the Sultan of Brunei.
Mead died in late 2019 at the age of 86, his career spanned a remarkable 60 years from 1959 to 2019. His work remains highly-influential today, and it’s studied in-depth by many industrial design students as well as students of automotive design, architecture, and interior design.
The Syd Mead Hypervan Model
As noted higher up, this is a scale model of the Hypervan, one of Syd Mead’s most famous automotive designs.
This model measures in at 18 x 5.5 x 6.75 inches or approximately 46 x 14 x 17 cm. It’s made from resin and has a metal plated body that features many details from the original illustrations, including various vents, shut lines, tail lights, and pivot points for the front wheel shrouds.
Here we see three of Syd Mead’s Hypervan illustrations. Each is slightly different, but the core concept of the vehicle remains the same. Images courtesy of The Syd Mead Archives.
Syd Mead first designed the Hypervan in the 1970s, but he would illustrate it a number of times, often with slightly different details. This model is currently missing one of its four rubber tires, however the tires appear to be small cut sections from an automotive model that are glued in place, so a replacement shouldn’t be difficult.
This model is now due to roll across the auction block with Julien’s on December 12th and it has a price estimate of $500 – $700 USD. If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can visit the listing here.
This is a sketch of the Hypervan showing how the interior would be laid out, with seating for five to six adults arranged in two to three rows.
Images courtesy of Julien’s + The Syd Mead Archives
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