In the future Volvo people will be able to delegate the chore of long distance journeys not to their chauffeur but to the car. Autonomous driving technology is already here today, fully developed. Such advanced technology has to jump the hurdle of governmental legislation. No government wants self-driving cars to crash even though extensive testing has resulted in no such incidents. Volvo wants to take away the responsibility of its consumers driving from.. say London to Leeds, a near 3 hour journey of 195 miles. Volvo want to place that responsibility squarely on the shoulders of autonomous driving technology. Volvo don’t want it’s consumers to face a rag-tag, tin-top Dacia inspired flim-flam of an experience. For Volvo interiors are all about the experience and Concept 26 is a preview of Volvo’s future autonomous driving environment and we like it a lot. Take note Fiat 124 Spider Concept 26 was named to reflect the average daily commute to work of 26 minutes – Volvo reckon that time could be spent doing something more meaningful than sitting in stop-start traffic. Like reading an eBook or eating your breakfast. Volvo’s intention with Concept 26 is to bring “choice and freedom back to the driver; to enjoy the driving experience when they want to, or to delegate driving to the car when they want to do something else”. Concept 26 is based around an all-new patented seat design that actively cradles the driver during the transformation phase into one of the three modes: Drive, Create or Relax. Concept 26 activates at the drivers instructions at which point the steering wheel retracts, the seat reclines and a large display emerges from the dashboard allowing the driver to enjoy the time spent in the car as they like. Dr Peter Mertens, Senior Vice President Research and Development at Volvo Car Group said during an interview “We have gone to great lengths to understand the challenges and opportunities that autonomous cars will bring to people in coming years, and our flexible approach to engineering and design, enabled by our new Scalable Product Architecture, means that we can readily bring this from concept to reality,”. That robotic emphasis really misses the point, interior refinement and design will be the next frontier, a new selling point for the consumer. And Concept 26 looks really swanky, but will it go into a future self-driving vehicle? No maybe not but it may well be that elements of the interior visualisation do.