Cardi

Cardi is a Russian design firm that has made several one-off sports cars, and SUV / sport car crossovers. Outstanding compared to other Russian cars, most of the cars aren't that bad looking.

This Cardi concept though has a few fugly details. Mainly the rims, the odd two-tone colour choice and the ugly chrome grille. However, I mainly wanted to display this for one reason.

Some specialty cars use other car's exterior and interior parts to save the money on developing their own. Most of the time they're borrowed from more expensive cars / brands. I've seen Diablo taillights, Passat tails, Mercedes and BMW pieces.

Cardi did similar, and borrowed taillights from the highly exotic 1986-1995 Ford Taurus wagon.

Banglerific Pickup

Well, not sure what to say about this. Don't know where it came from or who made it, but they managed to make the Bangle 7-Series even uglier. A hick's wet dream.

Fug-Masters - 60's Chrysler Group

Something was in the water at Chrysler/Plymouth/Dodge in the early 60's. Nothing else can explain the strange designs from that period.

One such vehicle is the '62 Dodge Dart (top pic). Only was produced one year, it was the last full-size Dodge Dart. However, with it's double headlights and strangely swooping body it seemed like two cars in one. It almost seems Virgil Exner-ish, but it doesn't actually seem cohesive enough.

Next down is a Dodge Lancer, which going from pictures seems to be basically a more attractive re-skin of the same design. Dart wagons looked like this but with the front from the top pic (all Dart wagons I could find images of were abandoned).

Last up is the 1960 Plymouth Valiant, which again uses a similar blobby bodystyle, but this time with a large, angry looking grille (most likely inspired by the 300 series).

Toyota WiLL Vi

One of several nostalgic niche minicars that are produced in Japan. Not surprisingly, the WiLL Vi (that is how they spell it) didn't last too long.

Designed to look similar to horse drawn carriages, the WiLL Vi was targeted at young women in their 20s and early 30s. Sadly it looks more like the unfortunate Citroen Ami than a carriage. I also like the "ribbed for her pleasure" look.

Chevy Chevette

One of a bunch of disappointing American subcompacts of the late 70's. The Chevette was the homeliest, and most likely had the worst name as well.

The above picture, taken from a period brochure, seems to illustrate that the Chevette is also the ideal vehicle in which to abandon one's children.

Attack of the Clones, Pt. 9

This post covers a multitude of cars: those American cars made in the late '70s through to the late '80s who all lamely tried to copy Mercedes-Benz. Either in pieces or in whole front and rear sections.

I'll start off with the top couple pictures, which are obviously Mercedes cars. The first is the W124 S-Classe (the first) born in 1979. It started the trend of Mercedes' look through the next 2 decades (until 1995 when the 4 eyed E-Classe debuted). Basically, the look was straight forward - a basic 3 block shape, with large rectangular headlights and wraparound turn signals. And of course the big M-B grille. Sadly due to different headlight regulations, most Mercedes of that era came not with the large, flush headlights but with an uglier recessed, split affair. I couldn't find a pic of the S-Classe with them, so I attached a pic of the similar looking 190E of 1984.

Ironically, American car makers choose to copy the bastardized American versions of M-Bs. Although it was most likely because it was cheaper this way.

First of the clones that I can remember is the 1978 Ford Fairmont. It's basically a relatively nice looking car, but the M-B cues are obvious. From the grille pattern to the way the turn signals are placed between the grille and the headlights, it reeks of M-B. Ford ended up making scores of M-B ripoffs throughout their lineup. The 1978 Granada has a M-B grille, but it's vertically staked headlights are different. However, the actually ADVERTISED the car opposite a Mercedes so you could see the similarities. Next, there's a pic of the 1984 Mercury Cougar, with an obvious M-B grille. Strangely, both Mercury and Ford copied the german maker. You think they would keep to one brand.

Worse off though was the 1980 Chrysler K-Cars, which I think are truely fugly. Not only did the spread like cancer to the backbone of every Chrysler product, they're also the most blatant of the M-B ripoffs. Not only that, the car just looks awjward anyway. The 4 doors had a bizarre cutoff rear window that not only limited vision, but extremely limited the amount you could physically roll down the window.

Attack of the Clones, Pt. 8

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Infiniti should be proud. Kia's new for 2006 Sonata twin (the Majentis, or Optima to us Canadians) bears a striking resemblance to the Infiniti Q45. Sadly, the Kia is slightly better off as it's headlights aren't so bug-eyed. Again, I wouldn't say either are fugly. But the Kia is plagarific.

SPAMMERS!

I may have to shut off comments is these f***ing spammers keep replying...

Fug My Ride

I have to say I have yet to see a "Pimp My Ride" car that hasn't turned out slightly fugly. I anyway has an pics, please email them to me. Their website is flash based, and also doesn't show many full body shots (possibly to hide the horror). I would "print-screen" and capture the images if they were worth taking.

This post was inspired from an episode I just watched, featuring a Chevy LUV. They painted it blue and added some tack on body parts that didn't look half bad. And then they stuck on some VINYL yellow and orange flames on the hood. Not only did it clash with the deep blue paint, it looked super, super cheap. Watching that show gets my blood pressure up. It's like the "Trading Spaces" of the car world.

American Celebrities + Fugly Cars = japander.com

Japander.com is an awesome site for Japanese weirdness. It's also a good site for seeing Hollywood actors at their worst. They go make these crappy ads for products they would never use, so one can only assume they did it for the money alone. Plus they wouldn't be discredited by American audiences because they would never see the ads! Or would they...

Here are the worst (car) ads on the site. First up is Charlize Theron. She's featured in a number of ads for Honda, promoting the Life minicar. Weird is an understatment. They all feature a horny puppet trying to impress Charlize. If she's not there he's fonding the car. While the puppet speaks Japanese, Charlize mostly only speaks English in the spots. And Madonna's "Like a Virgin" is inexplicably playing in the background in most of them. Not the original but a new high voiced, annoying version.

http://www.japander.com/japander/theron.htm

Stranger yet is another Honda Life ad featuring Ashley Judd. It's strangely reminescent of the Japanese ad featuring Homer's head on "The Simpsons". Also not the horrible - and English for some reason - play on words, "Hondaful Life". It may take a few minutes to process what it means, it's a pun of "Wonderful Life".

http://www.japander.com/japander/judd.htm