Elon Musk’s ‘Futuristic Art Deco Bus’ Design Divides Opinion

The design of Elon Musk’s Robovan, which the Tesla CEO revealed at its We Robot event on October 10, has been debated on social media.
As he presented the van to the audience, Musk said, “Can you imagine going down the streets and seeing this coming towards you? That would be sick.”
“The future should look like the future,” he added.
The Robovan is a pod-like self-driving vehicle that can transport 20 people and goods, Musk shared at the event, after the vehicle drove out on stage and passengers exited the van in front of the audience.
He also said that it would lower travel costs to around 5 to 10 cents per mile.
Musk described the Robovan as a “Futuristic Art Deco Bus,” on X, formerly Twitter, however some social media users did not appear to be sold by the design.
Many made jokes at the expense of the description. One user shared a photo of the song “Art Deco” by Lana Del Rey, and wrote, “My culture is not your costume,” parodying a phrase often used to signal cultural appropriation.
Other users seemed to question the revolutionary nature of the Robovan’s design by comparing it to that of a computer mouse or a toaster. A different X user appeared to reference the distinctive design of Tesla’s cybertruck, writing that Musk is “turning all vehicles into a 3D rectangular box!”
Newsweek has contacted the Tesla press office for comment.
Others however, seemed a lot more positive about the new product.
Nick Carr, who leads the Cyber Crime Intelligence Team at Microsoft, wrote, “are we living in the past or the future i cannot tell but i think i like it,” while comparing the Robovan to a streamline train that was part of the collection of Mercury trains from the late 1930s.
Mercury was the name given to the trains used by the New York Central Railroad for different streamliner passenger trains operating between midwestern cities, with the first one being used in 1936, according to Trains and Railroads.
A product manager at the generative artificial intelligence (AI) company NVIDIA deemed the design “gorgeous” on X, and said, “Absolutely love the art deco , retro-futuristic aesthetic.”
Another user described the Robovan to be “an art deco train straight out of batman tas!”
Musk showed the bus alongside the Robotaxi and Optimus, his humanoid robots who served drinks for attendees at the event, which the Tesla X account described as “your personal R2D2 / C3PO, but better.”
Do you have a story Newsweek should be covering? Do you have any questions about this story? Contact [email protected].