1953 Buick Wildcat Concept Car

Concept cars, show cars, dream cars -- whatever one chooses to call them -- come in two basic varieties.

Some are flashy, far-out designs.  A few might exist as excuses for young members of styling staffs to let off creative steam.  Others might be public relations gestures intending to cast the carmaker as a far-seeing firm.  Or maybe the two possibilities are combined in one car.

Other such cars are intended to prepare the buying public for features on production cars due for release within the next few years.  At one extreme are thinly disguised versions of future production models.  At the other are a few details on one of those flashy, futuristic dream cars.

General Motors' Motorama traveling shows of the 1950s included concept cars of all stripes because the company was rich and could afford both the shows and those custom-made cars.  The first major Motorama was held in 1953  Nearly all the concept cars in that show were geared to preview features on GMs major Oldsmobile, Buick and Cadillac redesigns for the 1954 model year.  Among these was the Buick Wildcat, the first of a series of Wildcat show cars appearing in 1953-55 Motoramas.

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Four Wildcats were built, one is known to survive.  The above photo was taken at an automobile show, but not at the New York Waldorf-Astoria Motorama.  Buick was not to produce a two-passenger sporty car for many years, so that Wildcat feature can be disregarded.

Here is a heavily retouched publicity photo of the '53 Wildcat.  GM used a lot of airbrush-enhanced photos in the early 1950s.  The objective was to clarify a car's features by eliminating distractions such as reflections of sharp highlights.  The result is an artificial look when seen in good-quality reproduction, but the photos probably worked best when coarsely screened for newspaper use -- the main publicity target in those days.

Two views of the black Wildcat displayed at the Waldorf.

One Wildcat was given a hard roof.  It also had a circular rear wheel opening, unlike the other Wildcats.  This car also carried a Sweepspear extension that flows over the opening, a feature already in production on 1953 Buick Skylark convertibles.

General view of a 1953 Buick Wildcat.

1954 Buick Skylark.  The curved trunk lid and ridges are watered-down versions of the Wildcat's.

1954 Buick Special convertible.  Its facial details were previewed on the Wildcat.  The headlight housings are about the same, and both originated on the 1951 Buick XP-300 experimental car.  The pointed "Dagmar" bumper guards are similar to those on the Wildcat.  The Wildcat's grille (derived from the XP-300) has concave bars, while the production Buick's are convex.  Photo from Auctions America,

These sales photos (lower from Auctions America) show the fender line on '54 Buick Special convertibles.  Aside from the sculpting where the rear fender starts, the fender lines of the Wildcat and these Buicks are similar, including the low humps at the rear.

Seen from the front three-quarters, the Wildcat has pleasing looks.  It would look better if those Buick "portholes" that normally were on front fender sides were not placed atop the fenders where they are hard to see.  They should have been eliminated.  The two air intakes on the hood do help enliven an otherwise bland surface, but other treatments might have done that job better.  The worst part of the design is the trunk lid -- oddly shaped, weird detailing.

Lancia Aurelia Berlina

The once-respected Italian marque Lancia (founded 1906) has been reduced to producing a single model, the Ypsilon, a fancied-up Fiat 500.  I fear for Lancia's future.

After World War 2, and long before being taken over by Fiat, Lancia introduced one of Italy's first true post-war cars, the Aurelia.  The name Aurelia is that of one of the famous ancient roads that led to Rome.  The original berlina (sedan) design was produced 1950 through 1955.

The English-language entry on the Aurelia is here.  For more detail, you might link to the Italian-language entry here and, if possible, have your computer translate.

Styling has been credited to Amedeo Piatti, though this source suggests that Pinin Farina might have been brought in to consult 1948-49 when the Aurelia was being developed.  In any case, Farina did design the 1947 Lancia Aprilia Bilux.  (The Aprilia was a prewar Lancia model whose production was resumed after the war).

Here is a photo of the Bilux.  Compare to the Aurelias in the Gallery below.  The cars seem quite similar from their B-pillars aft.

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Three views of the Aurelia type 10 B, produced 1950-53.

Two images of a the lengthened 1952 Lancia Aurelia berlina allungata, type B 15.  For some reason this car sits higher off the ground than regular Aurelias.

The final Aurelia berlina was the B 12, built 1954-55.  Design differences were fairly minor aside from the awkwardly raised front fender line.  They include: front-door wing vents; deletion of wand-type turn-indicatiors; revised tail lights; and the addition of running lights by the grille and turn-indicator lights on the front fenders.

The Aurelia's initial styling seems a little influenced by American designs known to its development team in 1948, but its overall character is that of classic late 1940s and 1950s Italian design.  The fender treatment is similar to that of the mid-1941 Packard Clipper, and the one-piece curved windshield might have been a Detroit influence.  Overall, the Aurelia's design might be called pleasant.

1955 Chevrolet Biscayne Concept Car

The Chevrolet Biscayne was one of a batch of what are now called concept cars shown at the 1955 version of General Motors' Motorama.  That was a 1950s cars-plus-entertainment show that usually debuted in New York's Waldorf-Astoria hotel and then moved on to a few other large cities.

A discussion of the Biscayne can be found here.  Like many other GM 1950s dream cars (what they were popularly called at the time), the Biscayne was to have been destroyed. But by a quirk of fate it was not, and is now part of the Bortz collection of concept cars.  Some background on this can be found here and here.

The Biscayne is interesting because its size.  It was designed at a time when American sedans were becoming wider and longer.  I couldn't find size statistics, but estimating from photos, my best guess is that the Biscayne's wheelbase was about 108 inches (2,743 mm), in the range of "compact" cars introduced by GM, Ford and Chrysler for the 1960 model year or early 2000s Ford Mondeos.

The nicest feature in my opinion is the treatment of the passenger greenhouse.  It's light and airy while the roof's side curves and the C-pillars add the right touch of solidity.  The interaction of the aft side windows, the backlight (back window) and C-pillars works very well.  The side sculpting that extends around to the rear is also well handled.  In contrast, the front end has a number of odd features.

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Here are two studio photos of the Biscayne.  The windshield is doubly wrapped -- around to the sides and up and over to blend with the car's top.  Production windshields with these features would appear on some 1959 GM cars.

The five images below seem to have been taken at the same photo shoot because the same house is in the background.  Colors vary due to aging of the original photos.  I adjusted these internet-based images as best my iMac would allow.

The Biscayne's rear is cleaner than the front.  And there are bumpers of a flimsy sort, unlike the unprotected front.

The two side views above help show the size of the car.  They also illustrate door hinging and the black & white photo offers a peek at the interior with its large (by present standards) steering wheel.  The rear-hinged "suicide" doors probably were included to eliminate the engineering required for a stiffened half-B-pillar such as was used on GM's 1956 production four-door hardtops.  However, the classic early-1960s Lincoln Continentals did have rear-hinged doors for backseat passengers, though with a stub B-pillar.

A closer view of the front end.  The bug-eyed, toothy look is distinctive, but in an odd sort of way.  A production version would have required a bumper even in those pre-regulation days.  And that addition would have destroyed the the entire frontal design theme aside from the headlight arrangement.  A production Biscayne with today's technologies might retain the general appearance of the show car's front, though the fender fronts would have to be rearranged.

Jaguar's Fancy Ford

In the days when Ford owned Jaguar, there appeared the happy idea that a smaller, entry-level model would help boost both production and profitability.  So product planners decided to use the new, second-generation Mondeo (produced 2000-2007) as the basis for what became the Jaguar X-Type (produced 2001-2009).

The link above, as of early July when this post was being drafted, asserted that the X-Type had only about 20% of its components from the Mondeo.  Also noted was a Financial Times interview with styling director Ian Callum who stated that nearly all the styling was done in Detroit, not at Jaguar.

As it eventuated, the X-Type sold fairly well compared to Jaguar's more up-market models.  But sales levels were far below expectations and the X-Type was eventually dropped after that Mondeo was phased out.

In the Gallery below, Mondeos in various poses are shown along with X-Types  in similar perspectives so that the extent of the facelift can be seen.  Ford's effort clearly went far beyond simple "badge engineering" (superficial detail changes between brands using the same body platform).

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As might be expected, similarities of these platform mates are strongest around the firewall/cowling area.  Compare the cowlings, windshields, and the front door cut lines.  The front air intake openings and lower running lights share the same locations, though not the same shapes.  Otherwise, the Jaguar's looks are different.  For instance, the aft part of the passenger greenhouse features a mild feeling (if not shape) of the well-known Jaguar "tuck" when viewed from this angle.

The Jaguar's frontal design has far more elements than the Mondeo's.  That was because stylists were trying to cram as many classic Jaguar large-sedan design cues as they could on a smaller, shorter-hood patch of automotive real estate -- the grille with the center bar and jaguar-head badge, for instance.  And the headlamps where the larger ones are at the edges of the car while the other two nestle against the grille.  But what is most troublesome are the not-quite-so-Jaguar-like various sculpted bits across the top of the front end.  From the left it starts with the curved top of the front fender: okay, so far.  But that is followed by a similar curve above the secondary headlight.  Immediately to the right of that is a more tightly radiused trailing edge of the grille frame.  Finally, there is a small, secondary plateau near the hood's centerline.  Way too much going on here.  I would have raised the fender line and main headlights slightly and replaced the fillets trailing the secondary headlights with a smooth catwalk with the raised part of the hood being more strongly tapered -- broader towards the cowling.  The front would still be cluttered, but less so at least.

Gasoline filler caps are in the same location on both brands.  Trunk cut lines and tail light assembly areas at the rear look similar, suggesting few body stamping changes were made.  The X-Type does have more of a bustle back.  Fender sheet metal and rear doors differ.  The Jaguar's rear styling is far less cluttered than at the front.

Ford's Cleanly Styled 1960 Galaxie

By the late 1950s, American automobile designs were in a rococo period of flamboyance.  Tail fins were common and their shapes elaborate, while swathes of chromed trim clad the flanks of upper-range General Motors cars.  Grille themes changed rapidly along with those of elaborate bumpers, annually churning the faces cars presented to the buying public.  And then appeared those awful quad headlights.  Ah, the curse of living in "interesting times."

All this was what could be seen on streets, highways and in parking lots.  But inside Ford's styling studios a sense of design sanity was starting to emerge as styling for early 1960s models was being finalized.  (The same was true at GM, though on a very slightly later timeline.  But Chrysler remained in the Virgil Exner zone of strange shapes for a while longer.)

The subject of this post is Ford's top-of-the-line Galaxie model (Wikipedia entry here) as restyled for the 1960 model year.  It was a considerably above-average design for its time that suffered the usual sad fate of being poorly facelifted the following year, 1961.

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1959 Ford Galaxie 500 - Barrett-Jackson photo
Setting the scene is the 1959 Galaxy, the final facelift of what was a nice new 1957 design that was badly corrupted for 1958.  Fords never had elaborate tail fins, and this Galaxie's rear fender features a fin transformed into small ridge atop a tubular shape.  The grille follows a fad for tiny shapes filling the air intake opening, a treatment first seen on 1958 Buicks and Cadillacs and currently being revived on Mercedes-Benz models such as the CLA.

1960 Ford Galaxie Starliner
Here is the hardtop coupe Galaxie, the nicest looking model.  The previous panoramic windshield has been replaced by a conventional windshield where the A-pillar leans backward.  In place of a tail fin we find a horizontally oriented blade running along the car's shoulder that ties into sculpting at the front of the car.  Quad headlights remain, but are better integrated into the frontal ensemble.

1960 Ford Galaxie Town Victoria
The four-door hardtop Galaxie has a less-graceful angular passenger greenhouse.

1960 Ford Galaxie Town Victoria
Even so, the greenhouse design is simple, relating fairly well to the rest of the car.  The large C-pillar is in the same spirit of previous Fords such as the tops on the initial Thunderbirds and even that of the unfortunate '59 Galaxie in the upper image above.  On the minus side of the design ledger is the considerable rear overhang whose only real justification is the trunk carrying capacity it created.

1960 Ford Starliner - brochure page
This shows the rear styling.  The side blades indeed have a jet fighter look where they terminate on the trunk lid.  By ending a little ways forward of the back end of the car, they reduce the visual bulk of the trunk and overhang.  Overall, a fairly clean design solution to the unnecessary problem created by all that overhang.

1961 Ford Galaxie - sales photo
Galaxie's 1961 frontal facelift was a step backward, though the concave grille is not a bad idea.  The problem is where the outer headlights "turn the corner" from the front to the car's sides -- often a difficult design task with modern, "envelope" bodies.  What we find here is a concentration of lumpy shapes instead of the cleaner separation of fender and grille found on 1960 Galaxies.

1961 Ford Galaxie - rear 3/4
The blade design is gone, replaced by rounded (and heavier-looking) fenders towards the front and small, canted fins towards the rear.  The fins and round tail lights recall the nice '57 Ford design.  In general, the aft end of the '61 Galaxie is a slight improvement over that of the '60 model.

1940 Lincoln-Zephyr Redesign

Ford's V-12 luxury Lincoln sales declined during the Great Depression, as was the case for virtually all American brands.  But for luxury brands with modest sales to start with, declines often were to unprofitable numbers of cars sold.  Such was the case for Lincoln.  The final year for those big Lincolns was 1940, but the brand was saved by the 1936 launch of a medium-high range model, the Zephyr (Wikipedia entry here).

Lincoln-Zephyrs were marketed over the 1936-1940 model years.  With the demise of the large K model Lincolns, the Zephyr name was dropped and what had been the Lincoln-Zephyr was simply the Lincoln as of the 1941 model year.

The initial Zephyr design was produced 1936-1939.  For the 1940 model year a largely redesigned body was placed in production which continued through 1948 with the exception of 1943-45 when American automobile production was halted due to World War 2.

All that said, let's consider that 1940 redesign.

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This is a 1936 Lincoln-Zephyr, its first year on the market.

And here is a 1939 Lincoln-Zephyr, the final year for the original body.  The front forward of the cowling was facelifted for 1938, and the '39 model was a minor facelift of that, grille bars changing orientation and the hood prow made more prominent.  Another 1938 change from '36 was the running boards being hidden by sheet metal.

This is an illustration from an advertisement for the 1940 Zephyr.  As is usual with illustrations, proportions were distorted.  I include it because it was the only image I could locate that showed a car in a similar orientation to those in the previous images.  The 1938-vintage bodywork forward of the cowling is mostly retained.  Headlights are now the new sealed-beam variety required of all American cars.  The hood prow is straighter and more vertical than for 1939.  Aft of the cowling the body is new.  The most visible differences are the larger side windows and the now-vertical C-pillar.

Here is a 1941 Lincoln.  It's included because the image is a photograph and not an illustration.  Also, the design is almost unchanged from 1940. (1942 Lincolns got a facelift that I wrote about here.)  Changes visible here besides the ones already mentioned include a higher, reshaped fastback and the elimination of visible door hinges.  Rear fenders look like they might be unchanged from 1939, but these are tack-on items and not intrinsic to the basic body.

The 1936 body was used for four model years, a fairly long life in those days.  That factor perhaps along with the planned demise of K-series Lincolns might have led Edsel Ford to opt for a new, somewhat more substantial body.  The result was not a great success aesthetically because it gave Lincoln-Zephyr a somewhat more ponderous appearance.  Retaining the old-fashioned flat windshield feature was probably not a good decision.  The same could be said regarding the 1938-vintage front end; it is lithe, contrasting with the heaviness of the rest of the car (which the large side windows do little to help).

1955 LaSalle II Sedan Concept Car

1955 LaSalle II sedan concept car was one of a pair using the name of a defunct General Motors brand that served as a companion car to Cadillac (Wikipedia entry here).  The other car was a roadster.  These and other dream cars, as they were popularly called, were displayed at the 1955 version of General Motors' Motorama.  Motoramas were cars-plus-entertainment shows that usually first opened at New York's Waldorf-Astoria hotel and then moved on to a few other large cities.  During the mid-1950s, GM usually included a number of dream cars along with production models.  The appearance of two LaSalle-badged show cars led to some speculation in car buff magazines that GM might be intending to resurrect the brand.

More information on the LaSalle II sedan can be found here.  It was much smaller than standard 1955 American sedans, having a wheelbase of 108 inches (2,743 mm). This was the same as that for GM's eventual compact car entry, the 1960 Corvair, or more currently, the 2001 Ford Mondeo.

Both LaSalle show cars were to have been destroyed, GM's usual policy at the time. But they managed to survive, badly deteriorated, to be acquired by the Bortz collection of concept cars. The sedan's entry on the Bortz web site is here.

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Here is the front design of the 1940 LaSalle, the last production year for the brand.  Starting with the 1934 model, a LaSalle visual identification feature was a tall, narrow radiator grille.  Those narrow, vertical slots on the catwalks appeared only on 1940 models, but were to be retained on the cancelled 1941 cars.  Barrett-Jackson auctions photo.

Part of the Waldorf-Astoria 1955 Motorama display area.  The LaSalle II sedan is in the middle, flanked on the right by what looks like a 1955 Cadillac and on the left by the Pontiac Strato-Star dream car.

Another view of the LaSalle II sedan at a Motorama show probably not at the Waldorf.  A 1940-style vertical grille was considered old-fashioned in mid-1950s America (for example, recall the unfavorable reception of the 1958 Edsel's design).  That, and the comparatively low hood probably influenced stylists to take a different approach.  What they did was borrow the 1940 catwalk slots to use as the main grille.  But those four horizontal swaths with rounded ends that wrap around the body below the headlights suggest the '40 vertical grille shape if it were laid on its side.  Front bumpers are light, but the bumper guards look lethal.  Headlight assemblies recall those on the 1940 cars.

A poor quality photo of the rear, but it's all I could find on the internet.  It seems to have been taken at a car show and not a Motorama.  Rear protection is sketchy indeed, but this doesn't matter for show cars.  The tail lights are nondescript and don't seem to support the overall design very well.

This publicity photo includes human models who provide as sense of scale.  The LaSalle II sedan is really fairly small.  Smaller than it looks without nearby people.  The concave sculpting on the side was picked up by the 1956 Chevrolet Corvette.  At the time it appeared, the lack of flow-through fenders or a shoulder below the side window sills attracted comment in some car buff magazines, writers wondering if this might be a harbinger of future production car features.  They were correct.

This car show photo from the Conceptcarz web site shows the LaSalle II sedan before restoration.  (Web sites conflict as to whether or not restoration has begun.)