Nissan’s Teatro for Dayz at Tokyo Motor Show is a clean canvas for digital sharing

Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. is exhibiting a surprising concept called Teatro for Dayz at the 2015 Tokyo Motor Show. This is the first car designed specifically for the generation known as “digital natives.” Teatro for Dayz is more than a car for a generation of consumers accustomed to transformational technology and the freedom to use digital devices for sharing experiences. It is an out-of-the-box concept that defies convention and rejects restrictions.

The necessity of eliminating added value

“Designing a car to appeal to the generation we call `share natives’ required us to intentionally not use knowledge and tried-and-true approaches we had amassed,” says Executive Design Director Satoshi Tai. “For example, through design we typically try to convey a sense of acceleration, power, or supreme quality. But these values do not resonate with share natives. If anything, such car traits just call to mind old-fashioned technology that bears little relevance to their lives.”

Nissan has surveyed this generation extensively. Nissan’s Product Planning General Manager Hidemi Sasaki says: “Share natives feel that time spent in a car should be time for connecting and sharing experiences with friends. We can no longer attract their attention with the same old values.”

Design that supports sharing ideas and experiences

Teatro for Dayz’s concept is “a clean canvas.” It’s about being able to freely create and share experiences. The entire car serves as a platform for inspiration, allowing share natives to design their own experiences, connect with friends, display an attitude and freely share them.

The interior of tomorrow is a clean canvas

Have a passion for driving? If so, you’ll be forgiven if your first reaction to Teatro for Dayz is, “Is this really a car?” After all, all you see inside the interior are solid white seats, a steering wheel and two pedals.

This is the “Future Canvas” interior concept: the appearance can transform according to your whim. Image display technology supports this concept — turning seats, headrests, door trim and the instrument panel into a moving screen.

Tai explains: “The interior can be visually altered according to one’s mood, for playing games, and in the blink of an eye to surprise friends. What Teatro for Dayz is, how it’s used, and what it could become are all up to the share native’s imagination.”

At first it may be surprising to see only a steering wheel and a flat instrument panel, but in this interior space conventional knobs and switches would limit display arrangement and expression. That’s why Nissan adopted voice control and motion sensors for the air conditioning and audio systems. In drive mode, meters and car navigation data are displayed on the instrument panel. When parked, it all disappears. Seats with bases that resemble balance balls feel radically different from the usual grip of a car seat, further signaling a departure from the conventional.

“Digital device” exterior design

Nissan made another unexpected turn with Teatro for Dayz’s inorganic yet warm exterior design. “We adopted Nissan’s signature V motion grill and headlamps,” Tai says, “but dropped the usual components that express aggressiveness: speed, size, elegance, and other traits you would expect to see on a car. This car’s identity belongs to the owner, and design assumptions we make just limit their creativity. This could also be seen as an indication of what people will expect of EVs in the future.”

With an exterior color scheme of satin white silver between full gloss white, the vehicle resembles leading-edge handheld technologies and provides share natives even more space for design creativity.

Teatro for Dayz’s simple, square design maximizes possibilities for communicating and sharing, both inside and out. The wide, open interior provides the perfect space for friends to gather, while the plain exterior features LED screens that enable further self-expression. Overall, the unusually simple exterior design creates a compact and grounded impression, with cleanly rounded roof and bumpers, wheels extended to the outer corners and radically short front and rear overhangs.

Teatro for Dayz — inside and all around it — is a canvas for individual expression. “How will share natives express themselves with this car? Just wait and see. They’ll share their first experiences on social media,” says Tai.

Expect this unique concept born from the hearts and minds of tomorrow’s drivers to create ways of enjoying cars never before imagined.