Is it just me? Am I the only one who was unaware that Deco cars ever existed in large numbers? Look at this 1948 Buick Skyliner (above). Was this really ever built?
Wow! A car (above) that looks like it's moving even when it stands still.
This (above) looks like a toy. Was there ever a real, assembly line version of this? Not that I know of.
I used to wonder how drastic tail fin cars of the 50s (above) ever got the green light from cautious Detroit. Now I have a possible explanation. They were okayed because, drastic as they were, they were less drastic than the Deco designs that preceded them.
How do you like this 1939 Cabriolet "World's Fair?" Nice, huh?
Many thanks to Pseudonym for turning me on to cars I didn't know about. Here's (above) the 1938 Phantom Corsair, which I assume was a concept car.
Woooooww! Look at that rear!
Also thanks to Pseudo, the 1936 Stout Scarab. If I understand right this was designed for mass production but the designer died and the funding collapsed after only nine cars were made.
Above, the Scarab interior.
Here's the Efijy, another concept car that looks like it's moving even when it's standing still.
The Efijy from the rear. Very nice!
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BTW: "Anonymous" wrote to correct what I said about Cars #1 & 2 and the Efijy. What he said is so informative that it deserves a place up front, under the post. His comment:
Fascinating! I didn't know Delahaye even existed! Here's another of their cars with a 30s look (below).
6 comments:
Honourable mentions: Phantom Corsair, and my personal favourite, the rare Stout Scarab.
This isn't an actual art deco car, but I do love the look of the Efijy.
Pardon my redundancy, as I may have said this before. I look at cars today and think why did they dump aerodynamics because they're building boxes on wheels now? How can that be fuel efficient with all that drag?
Anyway, beautiful cars, and thanks from the Pumpkin Queen and myself for the nod on your previous post.
Okay, allow a gearhead and lover of these old cars to chime in.
Car #1 is a famous custom car designed by mechanical engineer Normal E. Timbs. He worked with Preston Tucker of the defunct Tucker fame. His car was not a Buick, but did have a Buick motor. Everything on the car was custom designed and built by Timbs out of his own pocket.
Car #2 is a 1949 Delahaye, #5 is a 1939 Delahaye, famous French auto maker to the extremely wealthy. They made the most extreme and beautiful carriages ever, mostly one-offs made for customers like the Shah of Iran. Like Bugatti and Rolls, Delahaye produced their best deco designs in the 30s and 40s. These swoopy cars were sometimes designed by an outside artist, then given to the automaker to become reality for a "Concours d'Elegance" competition.
The Holden Efijy is not really a artist/concept car in the same sense as the above cars. The Efijy is a "custom" in the hot-rodding sense, my favorite hobby. It looks like it began life as a boring production sedan and was then "chopped", "channeled", "sectioned", "frenched", and "nosed". Perhaps Holden didn't actually modify an existing production car and instead started from scratch on paper. But the result, while extremely cool, uses many design elements common to the modern hot rod community. I suspect that homage was their intent.
If you love this design style, the best modern interpretation of deco cars comes from the Ridler Award competition at the Detroit Autorama (good search phrase!) from the mid-1990s and 2000s. Boyd Coddington and Chip Foose produced "Boydster", "Led Zephyr", and "French Connection" which moved rodding in a new direction.
I also strongly recommend you web search "Blastolene Brothers". This is the name used by a current artist/performance-artist named Randy Grubb who creates super-fun and totally impractical rolling art. My favorites include the "B702 Blastolene" roadster (gorgeous!!!), the "DecoLiner", and his "DecoPod" scooters. Too much fun!
Pseudo: Many thanks! I never heard of any of the cars you mentioned and they're all worth knowing about!
Joel: Yeah, I wondered about that, too. Whose designs were more aerodynamic, our current ones (boxy cars not included) or the deco cars from the 30s? If their designs were then why aren't we doing something similar. This is the era of fuel shortage, after all.
Anon: Wow! Very interesting comments! I put your note on the front of the post. Thanks much!
Anon: Yikes! I just discovered the rest of your post dealing with rods like the Boydster and with The Blastolene Brothers. I'll look it all up. Many thanks!
You're very welcome! I've enjoyed your blog for a while. My OCD self recently finished reading every single one of your posts in reverse chronologigal order. I really enjoyed it.
Speaking of OCD, I misspelled "Norman" as "Normal". That really bothers OCD me. Slob me is fine with it.
I forgot to mention, look up "Mullins Automotive Museum". I don't know where you're located, but this is in Oxnard, CA (near LA) and it's the best collection in the world of deco car designs.
www.mullinautomotivemuseum.com
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