Volkswagen Design Language Circa 2019

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Unlike some Japanese carmakers, Volkswagen has kept its styling restrained, not flamboyant.

The problem all automobile firms face is the need to test body shapes in wind tunnels as part of efforts to achieve good fuel efficiency.  This results in little difference in basic shapes within each type (sedan, station wagon, SUV, etc.).  Therefore, to provide distinctive visual brand identity, cars nowadays often feature elaborate sheet metal sculpting along with cluttered, oddly-shaped details and ornamentation.

Volkswagen's current design philosophy seems to take a contrarian position.  Sculpting tends to be simple and grilles and other details tend to have a horizontal theme as opposed to the curves and angles seen in many places elsewhere.

2017 Honda Civic Hatchback

An example is the Honda Civic shown above.

Below is a gallery of recent Volkswagen models.  The company haas been making a major effort to have a small number of platforms as the basis for a large number of models for its various brands.  Given a basic unibody structure, sheetmetal claddings can assume a variety of decorative forms.  However, the Volkswagen brand styling is largely consistent across various platforms and body types.

Gallery

2017 VW Tiguan
All the cars shown here feature a high sculpted character line along the side that starts abaft of the front wheel opening and extends to the rear.  Grilles feature simple, horizontal bar arrangements, sometimes supplemented by recessed vertical bars or small "teeth" as seen on the Tiguan above.

2018 VW Polo
The Polo is small with a small grille opening, though bars above and below the bumper are still horizontal.

2019 VW Arteon
A large VW sedan.  There are some fashionable angular touches in the headlight assembly and grille opening shape.  The VW design theme is retained in the horizontal bars at the front and the side character line.

2019 VW Jetta
The same can be said regarding the '19 Jetta, though its grille includes recessed vertical bars.

2019 VW Touareg
Grille elements are strongly horizontal.  Here the character line morphs into an evocation of a rear fender, and the side sheetmetal is dished in more than in the vehicles in the previous photos.

2020 VW Golf
The treatment here is similar to that of the Polo shown above.

2020 VW Passat
The new 2020 VW Passat continues the horizontal styling theme.

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