Stylish Non-Clothing Things - Page 17

Tannoy Westminster Royal

 

 

 

Lots of beautiful, purposeful-looking sports cars here. I like beautiful, purposeful-looking sports cars. But I love ugly, implausible-looking sports cars:



Bonus points for my wife finding this car absolutely adorable. If you want to draw crowds of male gawkers, drive a Ferrari. If you want to draw crowds of smiling young ladies, drive a cute hatchback.

(No I don't own one, and no that is not my garage.)

Another old italian (Click to show)

On the more practical/attainable side of the auto spectrum, one of my favorite car designs of the 2000s:



It is not likely to fuel the wet dreams of teenage boys, but from a design perspective I think it was just about perfect. Neither beautiful like a sports car nor in-your-face macho like a Hummer, the Allroad was everything you wanted in a "go-anywhere/do-anything" car, and nothing you didn't. Offroad, it outperformed 98% of the ghastly SUVs that were just starting to take over the American auto market. Onroad, it provided the performance and polite road manners of a proper car, not a rollover-prone high-center-of-gravity glorified truck. It managed to perform in both settings thanks to a clever airbag suspension system, increasing and decreasing ground clearance as required. The drivetrain was based on Audi's instant-classic 2.7L twin turbo engine. The exterior design was German austerity at its finest. The interior was simultaneously luxurious, spartan, and intuitive, like all Audis.

This car was the pinnacle of the station wagon. It demonstrated conclusively that there was almost no reason for the average person to buy an SUV when a car like this, superior in every conceivable way, was available. It was the car to obliterate the myth of the SUV once and for all.

Unfortunately, it turns out that Americans just like riding around in big, heavy, high-riding trucks, because we are dumb. This is why we can't have nice things like the Allroad and the S4 Avant anymore. Instead, Audi now sells us monstrosities like the Q7 (shudder).

I love those, the local Peugeot dealer has a black one in the showroom, as a show piece.

When you think about stylish cars you think about a lifted a A6 avant with plastic fenders?

I wouldn't have thought anyone would consider that stylish, it's like calling a Volvo 240 stylish.

LOL

I have a Subaru Outback sedan. All the benefits of the AllRoad with slightly uglier (carefully note the adjective) appearance, lower price and TCO, better reliability and safety ratings. And mine came with a Macintosh stereo

(yes, I preferred the AllRoad at first but I'm very happy with the 'Ru)

I didn't say the A6 C5 allroad was ugly (well it is a little), I just wouldn't call it stylish, as it's fairly bland to look at.

As far as I know the Allroad has the same Thorsen diff, as the normal quattro a6 avants, so it's basically a styling package with lifted suspension, special seats, and plastic fenders.

BMW 3.0 CLS

This needs quoting. I would sell my house, car, I'd even adopt children and sell them to a rapist to raise the cash for that car.

I hear you. To each their own, I suppose. I consider the Volvo 240 quite stylish. "Boxy but good" works for me. It is not "sexy" like a classic Ferrari, but neither is a Brooks Brothers blue blazer, and yet the latter is also stylish in its way.

I think that undersells the Allroad's capabilities quite a bit - to me it's like saying the RS4 was just an A4 with a V8 and flared fenders. But we're not here to debate cars, so I will just agree to disagree on the Allroad.

One thing we can clearly agree on is that BMW. Beautiful, beautiful car. And just boxy enough for me to not be self-conscious of driving it.

 

Pics of two different old Italians