Holls started his career at General Motors in 1952 as a designer in the Cadillac studio. In the late 1950s, he was promoted to assistant chief designer of Chevrolet and in the 1960s, was named chief designer of the Buick studio. In 1966, he was made group chief designer for Chevrolet overseeing three studios and the truck studio. To round out his design experience, he was sent to Opel in 1970 as chief designer to work on the World Car. Holls returned to the U.S. in 1975 to head the Advanced Studio ushering in a new emphasis on aerodynamics at GM. In the early 1980s, he was named executive designer in charge of all North American production cars and in 1986 was promoted to Director of Design at GM. He retired in 1991 after 39 years with the company. In his two-part interview, Holls describes his early days at General Motors, particularly his contribution to the side design of the 1955 Cadillac. He discusses the organization and design process at GM and the transition to a new era of design when Harley Earl retired and Bill Mitchell took over design. He talks about his work on production models of a number of Mitchell’s designs in various studios over his career. Holls talks about his trepidation moving from Chevrolet to the more conservative Buick studio and his work to modernize and clean up the Buick look. He speaks at length about his time at Opel in Germany and the experience this gave him, as well as a better knowledge of aerodynamics which he brought back with him when he returned to the US to head the Advanced Studio. He speaks about his difficulty convincing his superiors of the merits of aerodynamics and changing the shape of GM vehicles, design challenges of the 1980s when GM design was extremely conservative, and his role in pushing for aerodynamic studies and changes to vehicle design. He wraps up discussing the highlights of his career and more recent design developments at GM.

Collection contains 4 cassettes, 4 WAV files, 4 MP3 files, 1 diskette, 2 loose transcripts, and 1 bound transcript. Uploaded July 26, 2021.

Related items: Acc. 1734 William Mitchell Collection, box 3 Photoprints, includes Senior Design Staff at General Motors, 1975.