Defend Your Design: Polestar 4

Andrew Smart
·2-min read
2025 polestar 4
Defend Your Design: Polestar 4Polestar

From the July/August issue of Car and Driver.

Roughly half a decade after unveiling the limited-production 1 coupe and the mass-market 2 hatchback, Polestar is dipping its toes into the SUV space with the also uninspiringly named 3 and 4. Both models bring a new sense of style to the Swedish EV brand, but the lower-slung 4 is sure to drum up controversy. Besides ditching the wagon body style of the 3 for a sleeker fast-back form, the 4 forgoes a rear window entirely. Instead, a camera serves the role previously assumed by a big piece of glass. We chatted with Polestar exterior-design manager Steve Potter to learn more about the overall design of the 4 and the rationale for nixing the rear window.

2025 polestar 4
Is that a trunk or a hatch on the Polestar 4? A hatch, says designer Steve Potter. However, the 4 includes a removable divider that closes off the cargo area from the passenger compartment.Polestar

Car and Driver: From a design perspective, what makes the 4 an SUV?

Steve Potter: It has the stance and the wheels. With SUVs, it's so much about stance, really. Another thing that gives it an SUV character is that it's got extremely short overhangs. So, the wheels really do sit far out at the corners.

Why get rid of the rear window?

SP: You have the improved view with the rear camera mirror and a wider perspective. Moving the header section [of the liftgate] rearward and down enabled a way more aero- friendly silhouette. And then you have this huge, spacious feeling in the rear seat.

What about the safety hazards of nixing the rear window?

SP: The amount you see through the rear window is actually very small. With the camera system, you actually get a full panoramic view to the rear, so you see so much more than from a conventional mirror.

2025 polestar 4
The Polestar 4 makes 536 horsepower in dual-motor all-wheel-drive form but has zero rear windows.Polestar

Is there any element of the 4's design you would change or improve upon?

SP: The [side-view] mirror foot. It's got quite a lot of things in it—big cameras and stuff.

Why not move those cameras elsewhere?

SP: They're extremely sensitive in terms of their angles and positions they need to be in, so we can't just move things to where we want them to be. So we said, let's make a statement out of it. And then we designed it in such a way that's as pared down as possible, that it almost becomes a technical unit. In the end, it turned out pretty cool.

2025 polestar 4
Polestar

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