Macomb Trio Drives Design of Hot Cars at Auto Show

When you visit this year's North American International Auto Show, be sure to check out the new Super Sonic Corvette and the Camaro Convertible. 

When you see the sleek curves of the vehicles' bodies, the cool paint colors and the fancy interiors, you may want to thank three Macomb residents in particular, since they were a few of the key faces behind these great new cars.  

Kirk Bennion, Harlan Charles and John Cundy are three General Motors employees who have worked on some of the new cars on display at the NAIAS, including the Chevrolet Corvette and the Camaro Convertible. All three live in Macomb with their families and have become great friends while being coworkers who have a love for their job and for the vehicles on which they work.

Kirk Bennion

Kirk Bennion has lived in Macomb since 1989 with his wife and two children. He works out of the General Motors Design Center in Warren as creative exterior design manager for Corvette and Camaro. He is part of a team of creative designers, studio engineers, clay and digital sculptors who develop and create GM's future designs in a dedicated studio for Corvette and Camaro.

"We work in both clay and digital surfaces," Bennion said. "As a designer we are asked to create ideas in many mediums. Whether it be a pencil sketch, a paper mock up, a digital sketch, or a 3D-shape generated on a computer, our job is to generate the ideas."

Bennion said the Camaro Convertible is what's new this year for 2011. Also new this year is the color Super Sonic Blue for this year's corvette. 

Both vehicles can be seen this week at the NAIAS in Detroit. Also new for 2011 is a special edition Z06 Carbon, which also features Super Sonic Blue. 

Bennion's son Derek and daughter Darlene have both taken on his artistic talent. Derek is currently attending the College for Creative Studies majoring in product design and Darlene is a student at where she is showing interest in interior design.

John Cundy

John Cundy has been a car enthusiast all his life and said he is thrilled to be working at GM.

"I can truly say I enjoy going to work every day," Cundy said. "I feel blessed that I have been able to make  a career of something I enjoy." 

Cundy graduated from the Center for Creative Studies (now the College for Creative Studies) and was immediately hired by a leader of design at the GM Advanced Concept Center in California to sculpt clay car models.

After a short stint working for GM California, then several years locally with Chrysler Corporation, Cundy returned to GM as a senior sculptor.

"I have worked at the Warren Tech Center for the last 11 years on many cars including the Sixteen Cadillac Concept showcar, the current Cadillac SRX, the new 2012 Cadillac XTS, the Camaro, the Z06 Corvette and the next generation of Chevy trucks.

Cundy's job as a sculptor is to take the designer's sketch and his ideas and bring it to life in clay.

"The cars we work on today reflect the cars that will be driven four years from now," Cundy said. "My favorite is the ZR1 Corvette."

The models Cundy works on can be life-size or scaled down. 

Cundy lives in Macomb with his wife and four children who attend Immanuel Lutheran School. He gets a chance to share his love of cars by teaching clay sculpting in area schools.

"I have done several of what I like to call Clay Days at local schools," Cundy said. "I bring in scale model clay cars, the clay, clay ovens and sculpting tools and teach children the fundamentals of clay sculpting. The kids love the hands-on aspect and watching how to build a 3D model from a two-dimensional design.

"In Macomb I've gone to my kid's school, Immanuel, but I've also gone to Country Day in Oakland County and a few of the public schools around town. I use some of the clay models from students who have completed work at CCS and cannot take their model with them, say, a student from out of state. I will ask if they want to donate their model for me to use with the Clay Days."

Harlan Charles

Last but not least is Harlan Charles, a product-marketing manager for Chevrolet Corvette.

He started his dream Corvette job in 2001. Although Charles doesn't currently design like Bennion or Cundy, he does make requests for product improvements and creates market specifications for the engineers to follow using clinic, research and enthusiast data.

He also develops the desired option packaging and customer order guides. Charles represents Chevrolet marketing and the Corvette customer at the Performance Vehicle Line Team for the current and future generation Corvette. He makes sure product decisions support making the Corvette customers happy.

Charles began working at GM in 1988 as a concepts engineer at GM Design Staff and holds 11 U.S. patents. He has been a Chevrolet and Corvette enthusiast since childhood and currently owns two Corvettes, a 1999 and a 1990.

"I enjoy taking long road trips and have driven to 49 states and 10 provinces in my 1990 Z51 six-speed coupe," Charles said.

He and his wife have lived in Macomb since 2000.