NMBS/SNCB
The cross-stitch quilting on the
first-class seats’ leather covers
is like what you might find in a
Rolls-Royce or BMW car
Axel Enthoven, Yellow Window
T he new M7 trains for NMBS/SNCB
are the product of a collaboration
between Belgian design company
Yellow Window and the Bombardier-Alstom
consortium, and have earned a Henry van
de Velde award for their design.
The interior harmonises with the
operators’ 492 M6 cars, which will continue
to operate alongside the M7 trains in a mixed
configuration. The new seats, luggage racks,
LED ceiling lights and tables introduced on
the M7 can be retrofitted in the M6 cars as
part of a refurbishment.
“We wanted a new design that is a continuity
of the existing one,” says Sébastien Ridremont,
head of sales for Benelux at Bombardier
Transportation. “Because the customer wants
to meet the old cars with the new
cars, it should not be a complete
break of vision; we wanted an
evolution, not a revolution.”
Styled to last
Axel Enthoven, founder of Yellow Window,
says up to 1,362 cars will be made, to last for
30-40 years. “That’s almost a half century of
design trends that you have to foresee,” he
adds. “You don’t have to be fashionable, you
have to be stylish. The main idea is that you
have to be extremely prudent – timeless.”
The consortium selected Yellow Window
for this programme both because of previous
collaborations and because the designers
understand the needs of the market. “We have
18 Railway Interiors International ANNUAL SHOWCASE 2019
Seats are
upholstered
in leather in
first class, and
with fabric in
second class
worked many times with Yellow Window,” says
Ridremont. “We considered that it was added
value to have a Belgian designer that knows the
operator and the mobile context in Belgium.”
The Belgian rail network has seen
passenger growth of 3-4% per year over the
last 10 years, and continued growth is
expected. Seating density on these doubledeck
cars was a priority, but the designers
have made the most of the space to provide