The Tesla Model 3 interior is unlike anything we have ever seen before (TSLA)

  • The Tesla Model 3 has the most minimalist interior we've ever seen in a production car.
  • Not every decision was brilliant, but most were, and the ultimate impression is extremely satisfying.
  • The Model 3's interior design is a powerful symbol of both the company's philosophy and what it believes cars should be like in the future.


Tesla has completely reset expectations with the interior of the Model 3, the company's mass-market vehicle. 

We'd already spent some time with the car at a launch event for the $35,000 all-electric machine at Tesla's California factory in July. At the time, I wrote that it was the most minimalist auto interior I'd ever seen.

I experienced the Model 3 for only about 15 minutes back then. But this Tesla let us borrow bright-red Model 3 for several hours. Myself and my colleague Ben Zhang drove it around Manhattan and New Jersey, and we took in the zen-like interior environment, where subtraction is everything. 

This was a $55,700 version of the Model 3 — the company isn't yet manufacturing or delivering the base $35,000 car, just the $44,000 premium-level vehicle. So although the interior was obsessively minimal, it was made of the best bits and pieces Tesla has available.

Here's what we thought:

The Model 3 is Tesla's long-awaited, all-electric vehicle for the masses. It's smaller than the Model 3, it's big-brother sedan.Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

The Model 3 is also much less expensive. Our loaner was fully loaded and priced at $55,700, but that considerably less than the on-average $100,000 Model S.

Designer Franz von Holzhausen came to Tesla from Mazda, and you can certainly see some Mazda in the Model 3. But the car is its own thing, with a sleek visual language that carries over from the Model S.



Flush, chrome door handles are simply the beginning of what will be a complete minimalist experience.Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

Von Holzhausen's minimalism serves several purposes.

First, it's all about who he is and how he believes cars should look and feel. Second, it symbolism Tesla's overall philosophy about the automobile: cars shouldn't be complicated.

Finally, it connects Tesla with the world of consumer technology. The Model 3 could fairly be called the Apple iPhone of cars, and it has been!



Let's slip inside ...Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

Everything that isn't absolutely necessary has been taken away.Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

Form, meet function.

Up front, we have two seats, a leather-wrapped steering wheel with a pair of trackballs and two column stalks, a center compartment, that large central touchscreen to control nearly every vehicle function, and a side-to-side strip of open-grain wood.

There's no traditional instrument cluster, no mess of buttons and switches and knobs on the steering wheel, and not even any obvious air vents.

It's worth pointing out that we've seen this idea before. You can look at an old Toyota Echo — a cheap compact car, now discontinued — and find a minimal digital instrument cluster in the center of the dashboard.

But of course, in the Model 3, the idea has been made beautiful and refined. This is the Model 3's overarching automotive theme: take good ideas that might have been poorly executed before and recontextualize them in a way that's radically new.



The open-grain wood and brushed metallic trim is the only real deviation from the black interior color.Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

It's a brilliant touch. The Model S, when it first arrived, also aimed for a fairly minimalist interior. But some folks complained that it was so minimalist that it came off as insufficiently luxurious — for what was supposed to be a luxury car.

Tesla has since fixed that, making the lastest editions of the Model S far fancier inside. 

With the Model 3, is wasn't necessary to aim for luxury credibility. A $35,000 base price meant that the luxury buyer wasn't necessarily customer number one. However, an interior that was all black leather and brushed metal would have been too chilly.

The wood, a Scandinavian touch (we've seen something similar in Volvos of late), provides warmth and texture, tactility. And it definitely feels pleasing to touch.

For what it's worth, the quality of the plastics, often a sticking point in less-expensive vehicles, is quite high in the Model 3. Our tester also featured some lovely light gray and black Alcantara throughout, and although Tesla has since dropped the material, a type of synthetic suede, it also added yet another a nice tactile vibe.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

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SEE ALSO: Tesla customers are starting to review their Model 3s — here's what they have to say

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