Acura looks at new territory for signature lighting design

Detroit — Automotive lighting has gone from a functional necessity to a styling cue for headlights, taillights and even interior lighting.

Now Honda Motor Co.'s Acura division is looking at new territory: The center high mounted stop lamp, or CHMSL.

The CHMSL, pronounced “chim-sel” has been a government requirement since 1986. As the name suggests, it's a brake light mounted higher up in the car, typically just above or below the rear windshield.

With advances in LED lighting, automakers have transitioned the CHMSL from just a black box on the rear package shelf in the back of the car to an integrated part of spoilers or other exterior trim.

With its Precision Concept, introduced at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit Jan. 12, Acura debuted a CHMSL that becomes what Global Creative Director Dave Marek called “a sculptural element, piercing the rear glass, then flowing down to help form the structure of the rear headrests.”

The CHMSL becomes a narrow vertical line, rather than the horizontal band.

It makes sense to do something new with this light, much as other lights have been a part of cars now on the road.

“It's so flexible, the size of it and that you can do a lot of things with it that you couldn't do before,” Marek said in an interview on the show floor just after the concept's unveiling. “The idea is that it is celebrated, not just saying that we have to hide it, but using it as a design element. That's the key.”

The Precision Concept isn't tied to an exact upcoming vehicle. Instead, it is designed to represent what Acura intends to use as its “styling intent” for its products in the coming years.

Lighting, Marek said, is one of the five key elements that will be part of Acura's styling that will carry over across vehicles.

It isn't alone in using lighting for specific design cues. Advances in LED lighting, which use polycarbonate extensively, have made it possible for automakers to elongate or widen both front and rear lighting.

“Signature” lighting designs, from the “eyebrow” on the front end of Audi vehicles to an exaggerated C shape on Ford's F-150, have become standard in the auto industry.

New lighting cues are also showing up in interiors to make them more welcoming.

“When you get the right glow to it, it feels better, like you're walking into someone's home,” said Michael Stapleton, interior design leader for General Motors Co.'s GMC division, which launched the 2017 Acadia sport utility vehicle at the show, complete with lighting signatures for both the interior and exterior.

Acura's concept addresses an area of lighting that has been fairly static in comparison.

“It's not something that's placed at the last minute, but it's something that always has to be there, so instead we want it to be that kind of thing where you embrace it and try something with it and see what you can do with it,” Marek said. “I think all of the details are like that. It's form follows function.

“You need it to be functional no matter what you do, but it can be something different.”