By John Mellberg

I’ve had these photos filed in a brown envelope since leaving GM Styling in 1972. The car in the photos was a Firebird that was underway when I was assigned to the Advanced Pontiac Studio, initially working for Gordy Brown, Studio Chief Designer, and then, when management decided to shuffle the Chiefs around—Jerry Hirshberg became the Studio Chief Designer for Advanced Pontiac and Gordy Brown took over Advanced Buick Studio. It was a great learning experience working with both of these talented design leaders and the Advanced Pontiac team members. We had a lot of creative fun working together, while learning from one another in the process.

Working in Adv. Pontiac when I came on board was Roger Hughet (Assistant Chief Designer), Elia Russinoff (a lifelong friend), John Houlihan, Dennis Burke (a then GMI Co-op designer), Dave Rossi (Chief Modeler) Cliff Gabler, Kurt Struckmeier, Dean Towne, Juergen Stoldt, Klaus Brink (a good friend and Studio Engineer), and Rick Stuhlstatz (Klaus’ assistant). If I’ve forgotten anybody, my sincere apologies, as this was a long while ago.

This Firebird design was initially developed from a series of 1/5th scale clay and fiberglass models, from which one was picked to do full-size.  We had been working on the refinement of the design for about 6 months when Jerry Hirshberg joined us. The design went from a single theme, to 2 themes, or variations, with one side the sporty design with full wheel cuts, and the other side, a boulevard design with the rear wheels skirted. This gave the model an interesting split personality. At the time these photos were taken by Bob DeMerrill, a Design Staff Photographer, the clay model had been fully di-noc’d and details were cartooned by this writer to add visual substance to the design. The modelers foiled the headlight bezels/cans and trim around the tail lights. It was a bold, striking design, clearly a complete departure from the then current FIrebird, and would have been a hatchback. The large round headlights give the car a place in time, as it wasn’t long after we had worked on this that rectangular headlights emerged on GM automobiles and the others. The model’s color was a metallic orange, somewhat like the recent 2005 GTO Ram Air 6 Concept that Kip Wasenko’s group put together adding muscle to the Australian GTO beyond its appearance as had been shipped to the States as a Pontiac.

If I recall correctly, we abandoned work on this car when the then new Federal regulations for front and rear bumpers became law, as this design would not have been compliant. I don’t believe that I’ve ever seen photos of this concept proposal ever published. Perhaps my fellow design colleagues from Advanced Pontiac Studio who also contributed to the design of this vehicle can further add to the pedigree of this design and its history.—John Mellberg

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Mitchell’s Silver Arrow III

John Houlihan graciously sent me a copy of his letter to the editors of Collectible Automobile that provide insights to the origins of the 1971 Riviera, along with a few sketches from the project.

Dear Editors:

I read with great interest your article entitled 1971–’73 Riviera: Buick’s Beautiful Boattail. In that article Mr. Brown states that “It has never been clear exactly who was responsible for styling this car.” I can shed some light on this subject. I was a member of GM Design Staff and working under Jerry Hirshberg at the time the ’71 was designed.

While Dave Holls is essentially correct stating in his sidebar comments that Bill Mitchell heavily influenced the design, Hirshberg was the studio Chief Designer and supervised the crafting of every surface and detail of that car. However, another designer named Don DaHarsh, working for Mitchell in his secret back-room Studio X, designed the theme model in 3/8 scale before any of us in Advanced Buick studio began the’71 project.

Inspiration for the Mitchell/DaHarsh model probably did come from the famous Y-job and the Stingray, but Mitchell had a mania for sweep-spears, evident on the Delahayes of his youth and demanded that the project that was to become the ’71 Riviera employ this flamboyant styling motif. We inherited the model and Mitchell’s burning desire to create a magnificent and aggressive design statement.

Our first effort under Hirshberg was a superb interpretation of DaHarsh’s model—Mitchell’s swashbuckling excess and the design team’s fine sense of line, form, proportion and detailing. This model was on a combined A/E body platform. It had a deep “V” windshield tapering through the monocoque body to the now famous boattail.

Cost was the prime factor in changing the size of the ’71 Riveria. The unusual A/E package, the deep “V” windshield, and other economic factors of the times forced Buick management to dictate that we redesign our sleek coupe and use the B-body seating package and glass. At the time this directive was a disaster—totally destroying the original concept.

Our design team worked tirelessly for months to convert what was once a shark into a whale, albeit a superbly detailed and proportioned one. The beautiful car you see today is a tribute to this effort and to the skill of Hirshberg and his team. I am proud to have been a part of this slice of automotive history.

John T. Houlihan

Does anyone have images of that original 3/8 model or the first A/E version of the design?

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Chalk and marker rendering by Tom Semple

The day Tom Semple and I nearly did each other in.

I became interested in motocross motorcycles in the ’70s, and rode in the woods with several GM designers and sculptors including Larry Brinker and Bernie Smith. One Saturday several of us met up around Mt. Grampian ski area in Oxford, Michigan. There was a challenging, single-track loop about a half mile long that had hills, banked berms, and woods. Because it made a big loop, you could get to know the course, and each lap became faster than the last one. There were a couple of spots where you could get launched pretty good and get some air. And there were many blind turns. So for safety reasons, it was strictly one way. Tom Semple showed up with his Bultaco. I don’t remember who was going the wrong way, but Tom and I met in mid air, missing each other by inches. That was the day Tom and I nearly killed each other.

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Allan’s career goes like this: BS degree in Product Design/Industrial Design 1964, The Institute of Design of Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago. 1964-1980 GM Design Staff, Assistant Chief Designer, Buick Studio. 1980-2006 Nissan Design America, Chief Designer, manager Product Design, manager Nissan Design Lab at the Academy of Art University, San Francisco. Lead designer on Nissan Pulsar NX, NX Coupe, Altima sedan (first iteration). 2006-present, retired.

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Jerry Hirschberg, early ’70s.

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This is a Geza Loczi vellum sketch from the early ’70s.

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Al Flowers, late ’70s.



Jerry Hirschberg, early 70s.

Gary Smith, Cadillac Studio, 1987.

Bill Porter roughed out these two pencil sketches in the studio one day. I was so taken with them that I photocopied them when he wasn’t looking. Early ’80s.

This particular Grand National has a junkyard dog menacing look about it.

Herb Fishel worked under Vince Piggins at Chevrolet’s performance group. In the late ’70s, Lloyd Reuss and Buick Motor Division lured him away to start their own performance department. Herb would make frequent trips from Flint to the GM Tech Center at Warren, Michigan, attempting to get Buick Exterior Studio design and modeling support to create special performance vehicles. Buick Studio, run by Jerry Hirschberg, had its own problems with complying with Design managment requests and other corporate pressures and had little interest to help Herb with his projects that would simply rob time and talent from higher priorities. Whenever there was some performance oriented project, Jerry would always involve me in the project. Frankly, I was the only designer in the studio more interested in performance cars than my career. I had been in Buick Studio from late 1973, transferred from Pontiac Studio, and had designed the graphics for the 1975 and 1976 Buick Century Indy Pace Cars.

Frustrated with Buick Studio’s lack of complete cooperation, Herb approached Buick managment. After presenting his case, managment asked if there was any other way to get these projects accomplished. That’s all Herb needed to hear. Herb approached me to see if I was interested in doing projects on a freelance basis. Performance Design was created as a way for me to work for Buick independently of the studio. I left General Motors in 1988 and kept the name Performance Design as my freelance design business.

I created a variety of concept renderings for Herb using Buick Century and Regals. There were concept cars, race car paint schemes, and one vary notable concept, the Buick Grand National. The GN might have been Herb’s idea, I’m not sure, but he had me work up a rendering showing what it might look like. The rendering is dated 1980.

Rendering showing three Grand National proposals, dated 1980. Notable features included body colored bumpers, chrome steel wheels (on the red car), and black moldings.

Herb also had Moly Designs working on the GN concept, and he and Herb developed the all-red GN proposal. Moly Designs created the turbo-6 logo. I remember seeing that car on display for review on the Design Staff viewing courtyard. My original GN concepts had three GN proposals, one was all black, and another was all red with a black stripe. Moly was able to capture the feeling of the GN idea and added refinements of his own in executing one of those concepts. I remember that his all-red prototype better captured the essence of what Herb was after than any of the two-tone themes that were beginning to become a trademark of Design Staff’s idea of what a performance car was supposed to be. The whole idea of trying to make a performance car out of a Buick was a bit obtuse anyway, seeing that Buick had no real performance platforms like Chevrolet or Pontiac. Kind of like making a race horse out of a camel.

Original Grand National styling prototype created by Molly Designs for Herb Fishel and shown to Design Staff and Buick Division management. There is a similarity between Molly’s car and my sketch. Wisely, Molly left off the stripe.

During the ’70s all of the production studios were split except Cadillac. There were three Chevrolet studios, and two Pontiac, Oldsmobile, and Buick studios. Buick One ended up with the Electra, LeSabre, and Riviera, and Century while Buick Two had responsibilites for the Skyhawk and Regal. The 1978 Regal body design was actually done by N. Gray Counts who was a designer in Buick One. Steve Pasteiner was the Assistant Studio Chief in Buick Two. Any official studio work done on any of Herb’s specialty Regal vehicles would have to go through that studio. But at first Steve only executed concepts that were developed as a result of Herb’s involvement with Performance Design, including the 1981 Indy Pace Car. Steve got the credit for it because he did a rendering based on my proposal, and excuted the scheme in the studio. Credit for the 1981 Regal Indy Pace Car wasn’t that important to me, and since I was in Buick One, I had no influence on it’s execution. Besides, I wanted to keep a low profile because of the extracurricular activites with Buick.

Original concept rendering dated 1980 of the 1981 Buick Regal Indianapolis Pace Car by Performance Design.

There is a rendering by Steve Pasteiner that shows a two-tone GN, reportedly being a 1982 Grand National. I don’t remember the rendering or the car, but the GN never really changed from its original sinister one-color paint scheme. Probably the two-tone proposal was done to try and recapture the momentum and influence that Herb was gaining with Buick. There were a lot of two-tone paint scheme proposals floating around the studios in those days.

If all Buick had going for the GN was paint and graphics, it would be relegated to the scrapheap of history. But of course the Buick 3.8 Turbo provided the concept with enough power to come to the forefront of performance cars in the mid 1980s. That was the the decade of radical downsizing due to the influence of governmental regulation. GM’s performance marks had yet to catch up with the new rules and figure out how to build performance cars again. So the Turbo Buick was the first to step up to the plate and hit a home run.