Dan Brooks at StarWars.com speaks with Lucasfilm’s Doug Chiang and Volkswagen’s Alexandra Von Schaewen about a new ID.Buzz wrap inspired by the third season of The Mandalorian, as seen recently on the show floor at Star Wars Celebration Europe 2023.
“Last year’s campaign was so successful, and I had so much fun designing the wraps for the Obi-Wan cars, where we did the light side and the dark side,” he tells StarWars.com. “So this time we thought it would be terrific if we could come up with another idea.”
The result is a new ID.Buzz wrap inspired by the new season of The Mandalorian — now streaming on Disney+ — and Din Djarin’s modded Naboo N-1 starfighter. Debuting at Star Wars Celebration Europe 2023, the Mando-themed design is subtle and smart, incorporating the N-1’s metallic color scheme and other details, like the yellow stripe from the ship’s original paint job, vertical lines mimicking panels, and the mudhorn insignia, which Mando sports on his beskar armor.
“We treat our vehicles with a lot of character and personality, and the ID. Buzz is a terrific character. If you look at the front, there’s a terrific, warm, inviting face,” Chiang says. “So it seemed natural that we would merge the two iconic brands together, and for me, trying to imbue the N-1 aesthetic into the car was just brilliant.”
Chiang, who designed the N-1 for the Star Wars prequel trilogy, worked closely with Volkswagen’s Alexandra Von Schaewen, creative project manager, in dialing in the look of the wrap. “For us it was really important to catch the character of the Mandalorian and bring it into a car,” she said, noting that they darkened the Buzz logo and taillights to match the color scheme, while keeping a certain friendliness. Do they have favorite elements from the final design?
“I personally like the rims, because it really shows that we not only focused on the color, but really go into detail. We have the mudhorn logo in the rims,” Von Schaewen says.
“For me, it’s the whole package,” Chiang says. “All of those little elements add up to create one beautiful, amazing character.”
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