The Cars of James Bond: Toyota 2000GT

by J Kraus

Bond (undercover as Mr. Fisher of Empire Chemicals) hastily departing from Osato Chemical & Engineering Co. Ltd. headquarters to evade suddenly malevolent Osato security agents

You Only Live Twice was the cinematic Bond’s first visit to the exotic and mysterious East. Following the old adage when in Rome… it was decided to utilize a Japanese vehicle for the MI6 Agent. With that criteria; what could be better suited to transporting the world’s favourite secret agent than Japan’s first high-performance sports car, the sleek new Toyota 2000GT?

Where Were You In ’62?

by J Kraus

Pau Grand Prix, Pyrénées-Atlantiques, France, 1962

Auto Universum continues its decade-long 50th Anniversary of the Sixties series with a look back at 1962.

If you missed seeing Maurice Trintignant claim the chequered flag at the Grand Prix de Pau on Easter Sunday fifty years ago, you still had the chance to witness plenty of exciting automobile introductions, architectural presentations, product unveilings and cultural events that took place throughout the year.

The Allure of Period Colours

by J Kraus

Lord Brett Sinclair’s Bahama Yellow Aston Martin DBS in “The Persuaders!”

Ancient wisdom once held that in the vintage car market, red, white and black were the best colours for resale. However, as Bob Dylan once declared; The times they are a-changin’.

Early Porsche 911 collectors for example often seek out and pay a premium for the colours that made those cars unique to their time period: Signal Orange, Viper Green, Aubergine, Tangerine; even the more esoteric shades of Olive and Golden Green.

The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit: Don Draper’s 1962 Cadillac

by J Kraus

Don slides behind the wheel of a Newport Blue Coupe de Ville with Olympic White roof and blue Chelsea Cloth interior. He purchases it days later.

The other day I was discussing season two of the television drama Mad Men with a friend and not surprisingly, talk soon turned to Don’s new Cadillac. Prototypical of what a successful New York executive would have purchased in the 1960’s, it was quiet, smooth and comfortable; equipped with a full measure of the latest developments in convenience features and driving aids.

Did Don care about how much power it had? How fast it was? No; these were more the concerns of men further down the totem pole. They amused themselves with lower-cost, larger-engined Fords, Chevrolets and Plymouths. All of which could easily out-power Don’s posh new Cadillac. No matter; Don had no need for mere demonstrations of power; he possessed power.

Art and the Automobile

“Miami Beach” by Elliott Erwitt. 1960 Ford Thunderbird beneath hotel portico, 1962

Fiat 600: Pearl of Torino

by J Kraus

Fiat 600

The Fiat 600, today mostly overshadowed by its smaller brother the 500, was the car that put post-war Italy on the road. Introduced in 1955, the 600 was one of the many miniscule masterpieces that emerged from the brilliant mind of Dante Giacosa.

Signore Giacosa, like many early automotive pioneers, was a true designer who not only oversaw engineering of the chassis and drive train, but also supervised body and interior design. This resulted in a unity of style, function and clarity of purpose that is all but impossible to find today, when car designs are the product of too many chefs.

The Heyday of Cursive Script

by J. Kraus

1964 Porsche 904 Carrera GTS. A masterwork in the annals of badging: cursive lettering, gold-anodised finish, canted 45-degrees, and unique placement flowing over the curved transition from rear deck to rear quarter panel

Free-flowing cursive script is not often seen on automobiles today. It still survives at Alfa Romeo, Lamborghini, Maserati and Porsche. Outside this quartet it is rare indeed. In days past, cursive was common throughout the industry.

Such longhand script was often utilized to enable casting a complete badge out of a single piece of metal. The alternative was to either run block letters together, or connect individual block characters with a bar across the top (à la Ferrari,) a bar at the bottom (typified by BMW and Mercedes-Benz) or through the centre in the style of Alfa Romeo.

Pre-war cars used cursive scripting almost exclusively, although badging itself was generally minimal or nonexistent. In the 1900’s manufacturer nameplates were usually affixed only to the front of the radiator, and model designations were not displayed. In the thirties, even this practice declined, with most vehicles displaying the manufacturer’s name only via a stylized logo atop the radiator shell. After the war, marque and model badging began proliferating and begat its own art form.

Image from the Past

A BMW Isetta 300 Moto Coupé displays Christmas spirit

The Cars of James Bond: Triumph Stag

by J Kraus

Peter Franks arrives at the Port of Dover in his Saffron Yellow Triumph

Diamonds Are Forever, the seventh James Bond film, marked the return of Sean Connery as Secret Agent 007. Early in the film, operating under the cover of an assumed identity, he commandeers a Triumph Stag.

The evolution of the Stag began in the mid-sixties, around the time Goldfinger was being filmed. It was originally intended to be simply a convertible drophead version of the 1963 Triumph 2000 saloon. However, during its extended development the concept was revised to become more of a gentleman’s grand tourer and partly as a result, the Stag did not go on sale until 1970.

Eine Woche in Volkswagenwerk, 1953

by J Kraus

VW bodies travel on overhead conveyor from paint shop to final assembly, Wolfsburg, Germany

In April of 1953, German photographer Peter Keetman (1916-2005) spent a week at the Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg. Peter was a founding member of Fotoform, a group of German photographers whose work meshed abstraction with objectivity, often incorporating close-ups and repetition. The images resulting from the Volkswagen project eventually became some of his favourite and best known.

When Herr Keetman visited, VW was at a pivotal point in its history. The Beetle and the Type II Transporter/Microbus were the only two products Volkswagen produced. However, a third model, the Karmann Ghia, had been developed and was little more than a year from introduction. The Wolfsburg plant was still VW’s only automobile manufacturing facility, but their second European assembly plant (Hanover) was in the planning stage, and Volkswagen do Brazil was in the process of beginning pilot production.