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1930–1997

Larry Shinoda

Designer: Corvette and Boss 302

Hugger Orange 1969 Camaro SS 396
1969 Camaro SS 396 Photo: Sicnag, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons Original photograph License

Larry Shinoda links the GM and Ford performance stories. Working under Bill Mitchell in GM's "Studio X," he was central to the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray and the Mako Shark show car. He later followed Bunkie Knudsen to Ford and shaped the Boss 302 Mustang.

The 1969 Camaro's ZL2 cowl-induction hood is sometimes attributed to Shinoda; that design credit remains unconfirmed.

Shinoda came up in GM Styling, and the small Studio X group's Sting Ray and Mako Shark were two of the most influential American designs of the decade.

When Knudsen left GM to become president of Ford in February 1968, Shinoda went with him. At Ford he did the Boss 302 Mustang and its graphics, the car built to fight the Camaro Z/28 in Trans-Am. Few designers worked on both sides of that rivalry.

The ZL2 "Super Scoop" hood attribution connects his Corvette work with the Camaro, but the sources cited here do not establish who designed that hood. Shinoda's documented Corvette and Boss Mustang work provides the firmer link between the two performance-car programs.

Did you know

  • Shinoda's route into Bill Mitchell's circle is a legend about a stoplight. The story goes that Mitchell, in a hot-rodded car, met the young stylist at a light outside the Tech Center and got beaten, and moved him into the Corvette work soon afterward.
  • He came to Ford in 1968 and left in 1969, when Knudsen was fired. In November 1970 he and Knudsen went into business together, founding Rectrans; White Motor Company acquired it in 1971 and named Shinoda a design vice president.
  • He joined GM Styling as a senior designer in September 1956 and stayed until 1968. At GM he worked in Studio X, under the lobby of the Styling building, on the XP-87 Stingray race car with Mitchell around 1958.
  • The National Corvette Museum inducted Shinoda into its Corvette Hall of Fame in 1998, in the GM/Chevrolet category. Its institutional profile also confirms his March 25, 1930 birth and November 13, 1997 death.
  • Late in life he was fighting over the Jeep Grand Cherokee. In 1985 he had competed for AMC's XJC project under a $354,000 contract but was paid $135,000, and Chrysler settled with him for more than $200,000 shortly before he died.
  • Shinoda was born Lawrence Kiyoshi Shinoda on March 25, 1930, in Los Angeles, and died November 13, 1997, at 67 at his Michigan home.
Sources for these details

Key beats

  • Corvette Sting Ray and Mako Shark (GM)
  • GM performance-design context
  • Boss 302 Mustang (Ford)