Do Look Back

In 1969, as Fiat looked forward to a new decade, there was a desire to reflect that milestone with a new, stylish coupe to appeal to younger customers.   Design was commissioned from Pininfarina, where Paolo Martin took charge of the job.   Designated as project X1/8, initial 128 platform-based proposals featured a low, ‘sharp’ bonnet line and a variety of rear roof/boot profiles: By mid-1970 a first prototype had been rendered, as below: Followed at the beginning of the subsequent new year by this: Further detail development resulted in the form as seen in July 1972, and renamed as X1/20: As may be apparent from the illustrations above, there was difficulty in this design with resolving the rear of the car.  A harmonious whole-form profile was largely realised with the X1/20, but achieving a balance of aesthetic appeal with the practical issue of visibility for the driver continued to exercise the stylists, as evidenced by these studio sketches: In the meantime, another interpretation

Here's my list of three of the best things to have come to us courtesy of the Japanese automotive manufacturing industry: Honda Formula One and Indycar engines, the Mazda paint colour, Soul Red , and the Honda CRX.   In the late 90s, when my wife’s Scirocco suffered an existential crisis, she showed me an ad for a model of car I’d not previously much noticed.  As we looked around it, I found myself thinking it was quite a neat little car with understated styling, and, though it was around ten years old, it was in rather nice condition.  All quite cosy and unremarkable, until . . . we got in it and went for a test drive.  I immediately felt at one with it, very much in the same way I’d liked so much about a couple of Alfasud Sprint Veloces I’d run a decade and an half previously.  They were cars that seemed to fit just like a glove, giving a feeling of a seamless connection with the steering wheel and pedals and making the driving of them an especially pleasurable physical experie