“…I think that helps explain why so much of their styling seems so bland… “ – CatsEye6
What’s wrong with bland styling? Recent Civic, Corolla, Camry… etc. are indeed bland, but they are successful sales wise. It is not that the Japanese designers cannot design cars attractive to eyes, but it is the decision-making process at Japanese automakers that tend to choose conservative appliance-like styling design. When they try to let the designer have a semi-free hand, usually it ends up with a disaster, such as the Subaru Tribeca B9 and Impreza designed by Andreas Zapatinas (ex-Fiat).
In addition to Osamu Shikado mentioned by rrocket above the following are examples of designers who shone in the right environment:
Larry Shinoda – 63 Corvette Sting Ray, Boss 302 Mustang
Satoshi Wada (ex-Nissan) – Audi A6, Q7, A5
George Nagashima – BMW
Jun Okazaki (ex-Mazda) - Renault
Ken Okuyama – Ferrari Enzo
Norihiko Harada – Lancia Epsilon