Ford Motor Company design chief J Mays to be based in London

Sat, 18 Dec 2004

J Mays, Ford Motor Company group vice president for design, will be moving from the US to London in February and adding a new title: Chief Creative Officer.

The new posting will allow Mays to work more closely with designers at Ford's Premier Automotive Group, including Ian Callum at Jaguar, Geoff Upex at Land Rover and Volvo's next design head. He will spend about 10 days a month in Dearborn with the North American design team.

"London is ground zero for media creativity," he said. "There is more going on in media design and graphic design there. I hope to add more creative spark to the brands by looking at these areas. We will place additional emphasis on developing a long-term design strategy for each brand. We'll work together with our counterparts in each of the brands to envision a range of future design solutions, and then agree to a direction on how each brand and its design strategy will evolve over the next ten years and beyond."

Mays oversees Ford, Mercury, Lincoln and Mazda design, as well as the European luxury brands Jaguar, Land Rover and Volvo.

Peter Horbury, former Volvo design chief, remains in charge of North American design. Martin Smith was recently appointed to run Ford's European design operations.