"The usual suspects' is one of my favorite movies," says Henrik Fisker as he pilots his sleek Tramonto convertible prototype along the Southern California coast, the warm air tugging at the open collar of his chalk-striped shirt, the late-afternoon sun glinting off his designer sunglasses and Porsche Design watch. "It's not a movie that makes you go, 'Wow! Look at that!' It's a slow burn. It takes its time but it really gets hold of you. That's how I want the designs of my cars to be. I want them to draw you in. I want people to enjoy my cars the more they look at them." People are looking at Fisker's cars all right—and many can't pry their eyes away BMW Z8 roadster. Shelby GR1. A big stake in the Aston Martin DB9. Aston AM V8 Vantage (on view just a few pages away). Many automotive designers would kill to have the recognition generated by even one of those stylistic tours de force. And Fisker did them all. If this great Dane's hand were any hotter, you'd need tongs to shake it. Now, Fisker is betting his future on the cachet of his designer label. Last January he and manufacturing guru Bernhard Koehler (who worked with Fisker at BMW and Ford), backed by 12 investors from around the world, launched Fisker Coachbuild, LLC, in Newport Beach, California. Their plan: Using sumptuous cabin materials, Fisker-designed bodywork, and an innovative assembly process, transform existing premium-car platforms into even more exclusive and luxurious limited-edition couture for the wealthy few (price: $200,000 to $300,000). No big-corporation constraints, no focus groups, no production-line compromises—Fisker insists his cars will come straight from his gut. "In the auto world today" he says, "You have two types of design. There's concept design, where automakers build cars to show the industry and journalists how great they are. Then there's production design, where that cool milled-aluminum center console from the concept car becomes spray-painted plastic. I wanted to build a car where some of these concept things actually made it into production. We don't have marketing data here. If we feel a car is right, we just do it."
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