I attended the 1.5 press days of the North American International (i.e. Detroit) Auto Show earlier this week. You’ll find detailed coverage on many other sites. Here I’ll just post a few of my personal impressions, covering the makes in alphabetical order.

First, a general comment. Like last year, but perhaps to an even greater degree, the auto show had fewer car makers participating and fewer journalists in attendance–perhaps half 2007. There were no fancy presentations. Only the Germans seemed to be serving fancy food. And the single major post-show party, hosted by Hyundai, was a far cry from Chrysler’s Firehouse party of past years.

Acura gave no presentation. I checked out the ZDX for the first time. Car & Driver quipped that ZDX should stand for “zero demand expected.” After all, how many people are looking for a vehicle that combines the size and mass of an SUV with the practicality of a sports car? The interior is perhaps Acura’s nicest yet, with a leather upholstered IP lower and console. But it was literally a pain for me to get into and out of the back seat–the rear roofline is very low.

Audi showed a TT-sized electric sports car. The world hardly needs another expensive electric sports car, so I ignored it.

I paid much more attention to the new Audi A8. I personally find the new sheetmetal unattractive, or at least boring, and certainly far less distinctive and attractive than the current A8. The front end is too massive, the wheel openings cut too high into the body (for overly large wheels?), and the beltline (base of the side windows) and the character line below it are too horizontal. At best it’s boring.

So I was shocked when a group of distinguished designers voted the new Audi A8 the best production design introduced at the show. With few new designs introduced, they didn’t have many to select from. But still, this one? I’d have gone with the 2012 Ford Focus. Clearly these designers know nothing about design!

Or perhaps they were focusing on the interior, which is among the best. But then so is the current A8’s. The new interior isn’t significantly different than the current one, with one notable exception that I’ll discuss in a separate post.