While the Opel Suits aren't quite coming right out and saying it, you're looking at the face of the new Vectra, due to arrive in dealerships in 2008. The GTC Concept, unveiled on Monday evening ahead of the Geneva Motor Show press day, is Opel's heads-up of its new styling direction. Which, to be honest looks a bit like the current design direction, but with some of the sharper lines softened by wider radius curves.
It's notoriously difficult to tell much from concepts, shown indoors under bright lights, but the GTC looks as if it will introduce more vertical features into Opel styling, going down the Audi route of deeper grilles and subtler curves, with broad flared wheelarches. Inside, it looks almost production ready, with a wraparound dash shape that incorporates a lot of familiar Opel interior design cues.
It's not yet clear if Opel plans to make a Vectra Coupe, keeping the GTC's overall shape for a production car, but it might make sense to try and nudge the Vectra's current, dowdy image in a more design-led direction. What's very unlikely to make it all the way to the production Vectra is the Flex-4 seating system. It slides the two rear seats forward so that they 'clamshell' against the front seats, while at the same time pulling a luggage floor cover behind them, transforming the GTC's interior from four-seater to two-seater with a massive boot. It wouldn't make much sense for a five-seat Vectra, but Opel may keep it for a future Meriva replacement.
One significant thing though; the GTC gets four-wheel drive, which might mean that future OPC high performance models may switch to this on-demand system. Opel has been criticised for trying to pump ever higher power outputs through the front wheels of current OPC models.
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