One of the crucial attributes for a car designer to possess is the ability to separate what they personally like, from what customers like. It’s important for me when either designing a car, talking about the design of cars, or reviewing cars, to put aside my own preferences and tastes and understand what’s important to people actually buying the thing in question. My fallback analogy is this: I hate the sodding Beatles. Their stupid haircuts. Their stupid suits. Their stupid jangled caterwauling. All of it makes me want to scoop out my eyeballs with a melon baller and shove an ice pick through my ears. I just don’t like them but the point is I do recognize their importance and why other people like them, even if it’ll be a cold day in hell before any of their music darkens my playlists. Another bit of swinging sixties Britishness that is universally adored but I’m caustically ambivalent about is the Jaguar E-Type. Put the kettle on (coffee, white, no sugar and don’t bring me any of that freeze-dried instant crap), it’s time for Damn Good Design.
Enzo Ferrari supposedly called it “the most beautiful car ever made” (it’s unclear whether he actually said such a thing). It’s one of six cars on permanent display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (David, Torch and Mercedes will no doubt be thrilled to learn three of the others are a Willys Jeep, a Beetle and a Smart). No click bait list of best looking cars is complete without an E-Type somewhere near the summit. Good grief it’s all so predictable. Saying you like E Types like saying you like The Beatles. Can’t you make even a modicum of effort into being just a little bit original?
Jaguar as we know and understand it really got going properly as a car company after the Second World War, that particular dust-up forcing a change of name from the Swallow Sidecar Company. Their first post-war sports car was the sensational XK120 of 1948 – named after its top speed of 120mph. It was a raffish unadorned streamliner that riffed on the profile of the pre-war BMW 328. Solid steel wheels and enclosed rear wheel arches gave the original roadster a touch of the art-deco. It represented a yearning for speed and glamour from a bombed-out country still reeling from war. Clark Gable and Humphrey Bogart were among the first customers for what was then the fastest production car in the world. As the forties became the fifties the XK120 begat the XK140 and finally XK150, moving further away from the original’s simplicity to a more traditional wood trim and wire wheels look.
I Want That Car And I Want It Now
In 1951 and 1953 Jaguar had been victorious at Le Mans with the C-Type, a racing version of the XK120. They followed that up with a purpose-built racer, the D-Type, which won the race in 1955, 1956 and 1957. Both these cars had their shape honed by the aerodynamicist Malcolm Sayer, who had previously worked at the Bristol Aeroplane Company during the war. The quintessential British boffin, his aerodynamic curves created from mathematical formulae helped the big cats on the mighty Mulsanne straight, but away from the unique challenges of Le Sarthe, Jaguar’s fortunes in the World Sportscar Championship were mixed. This led to several unsold customer D-Type racers being converted into a road-going version, the XKSS, but Sir William Lyons had long wanted a new high-speed sports car to replace the XK150.
What emerged in 1961 at the Parc des Vives hotel in Geneva was no less a sensation than the XK120 had been thirteen years earlier. A heady mix of wartime and racing engineering experience clothed in Sayer’s aero forms further developed from the D-Type, the E-Type was all thrusting symbolism and mechanical theatre, dripping with tumescent sex appeal. The voluptuous curves of the D-Type had been stretched, smoothed and rounded into something a lot less feral and a lot more suggestive.
It sent the press and public alike into fits of rapture – priced at a bargain £2097 for the roadster and £2196 for the fixed head, nothing could touch its combination of speed, style and price. It had a 3.8-liter XK straight six engine lifted from the D-Type making 265bhp, a four speed box and crucially, independent rear suspension and disc brakes. Jaguar claimed a top speed of 150 mph when the typical asthmatic family sedan of the time would struggle to gasp its way much past seventy. Jaguar’s top speed claims might have been exaggerated but it didn’t matter. You were not going faster at any price.
Aston Martins and Ferraris at double or triple the E-Type’s money were not even close. When it appeared in New York a month after Geneva, Frank Sinatra apparently said “I want that car, and I want it now.” Bogie’s opinion on the new Jaguar remains sadly unrecorded, as by then he was worm food. Still, it’s impossible to overstate the effect the E-Type had on its release. Sir William Lyons certainly wasn’t ready for its impact; because of their slightly antiquated production methods, Jaguar couldn’t build the cars fast enough.
Iconic upon launch, the E-Type has remained an object of lust and desire in the sixty years since. Good going for a car built in an unglamorous ex-wartime factory by men in brown coats with horn-rimmed glasses. Even if it hadn’t been the fastest thing on the road in its day people would still have revered it for the way it looks. And this is where my problems with the E-Type begin.
Breaking The Rules
When you enroll at car design school you are not handed a big book of Car Design Rules that Are Not To Be Broken. The closest thing to a default text is probably H-Point, which doesn’t get into the aesthetic side of things at all but covers pretty much everything else. However, there are rules, or rather guidelines that will help nudge you in the direction of a pleasing aesthetic outcome as you scratch your way through hours upon hours of sketching sessions. It takes time, trial and error, and an innate artistic sensibility to gain an understanding of what works and doesn’t, and why. Although Malcolm Sayer was in the strictest sense an engineer, he did have an artistic side. And the E-Type does break a couple of what we would now consider cardinal car design rules, but by gets away with it through sheer chutzpah.
A healthy dash-to-axle ratio is something that idiots think defines how good a car looks. It concerns how far away the centerline of the front wheels is from the base of the windshield when looking at a car from the side. Taking this dimension in isolation, the E-Type has way too much of it; a consequence of packaging a locomotive of an inline six in what is a very small car – only 145” (4.6m) long, 65” (1.6m) wide and 48” (1.2m) high. But taken as an overall proportion, the bonnet length is balanced out by the passenger cabin taking up almost the entirety of the back half of the car, and the fact it sits very lightly on its inset wheels.
Another issue in side profile that goes against the rules is the pillars. Ideally, side pillars should all align to an imaginary convergence point (or points) somewhere above the roof of the car. On the E-Type the A and B pillars are parallel. By itself this is not a massive problem – the B pillar had to be at that angle because otherwise the side glass wouldn’t be able to drop into the door. But A-pillar being so upright creates an unholy mess at the base where it joins the sheet metal, because the door shut line then has to travel forward to create a big enough door opening to swing your legs in. Thus with the door open there’s a bloody great corner in the door opening, perfect for cracking your kneecaps on. This was probably driven by Sayer wanting as much curvature in the windscreen as possible for aerodynamic reasons, but it’s a compromise too far. Better to move the base of the A pillar forwards and flatten out the windscreen a bit, giving you a bigger door opening and then you could make do with two normal size wipers, rather than three tiddly ones.
You get the feeling looking at an E-Type that the metal skin is struggling to contain everything inside it. The way the bonnet bulges. The mechanicals hanging out underneath the car, in particular the no-effort-made exhaust pipes. The passenger compartment barely wrapping around two occupants and their luggage. This is not someone wearing something tight but considered in order to look alluring – it’s the twat wearing Aviators who skips leg day in a top two sizes too small. It’s almost bursting out all over the place. And don’t get me started on the humpbacked 2+2 or the later bloated series III V12 models, which were just embarrassing. For a car verging on caricature, they push it too far into bad comedy.
Sayer designed aircraft before he designed cars; little wonder the E Type looks like a tear in the wrong place and it’ll explode like a Comet airliner. That may sound a bit melodramatic but remember that bargainacious purchase price? These things were thrown together from cheap materials, and Jaguar didn’t exactly have a reputation for reliability. In one darkly humorous episode of Mad Men, one of the major characters attempts to gas himself to death, using the exhaust from his E-Type. But he fails because the car won’t start. But was their ever more perfect car casting than Jaguar in a sixties set show about ostensibly high-flying, good-looking men drinking and womanizing their way through the working week?
It’s The First Footballers Car
And this is the second part of my problem with the E-Type. It was released right at the start of the swinging sixties. Away from Hollywood stars, it was the epitome of ‘a lot of flash for not much cash’ – the very first footballers car. George Best, probably the first celebrity footballer and a man known for his heroic exploits on the pitch, in the bar, and in the bedroom, had three E-Types.
American automotive journalist Henry Manney III, with a timely flourish of ear-appropriate sexism, called it “the greatest crumpet catcher known to man.” Are you in a spandex-clad metal band? Don’t shove armadillos in your trousers – stick a 1:18 die-cast E-Type model down there instead. Forget figuratively, it is literally a dick on wheels. Part of me can’t help feeling that part of the E-Type’s enduring appeal to the male enthusiast is that deep down in the lizard part of their brain, they think it will make them irresistible. If the Mini was the classless part of Carnaby Street and the Swinging Sixties, the E-Type was déclassé.
A lot of my antipathy towards British sports cars of the sixties is based on the fact I felt they represented a nation in post war decline – fashionable on the surface while doing little to advance the state of the art underneath. The E-type was of the moment when it was released in 1961, but being based on a racer that last won Le Mans in 1957 it was trading on former glory. You might think I’m being harsh, but in 1963, just two years after the E-Type launched, the C2 Corvette, Porsche 911 and Mercedes Pagoda all appeared, advancing the state of the sports car art in very different ways while simultaneously making the E-Type look very old hat indeed.
Finally wheezing off the stage like Jumpsuit Elvis in 1974, despite several aborted attempts Jaguar never really replaced the E-Type properly until the F-Type appeared in 2013. That car dies this year as Jaguar rebrands itself as a maker of high-end EVs.
The Corvette, 911 and SL continued to evolve and stay relevant, and are all still in production.
All images courtesy of Jaguar Media
There’s a Place for the E-Type, probably driving down Abbey Rd. But it doesn’t make me twist and shout when I see one. If I were to have a classic jag in my life, it’d be the XK150 Coupe. Maybe I’ll get one when I’m 64.
We can work it out.
Would you drive it eight days a week?
“Jaguar’s top speed claims might have been exaggerated but it didn’t matter. You were not going faster at any price”
This reminded me of one of my father’s favourite stories…..
Roughly the time when the E-type was new, and the M1 had just opened, my dad and his best mate were racing a Brabham BT8 around the club-circuits of the UK.
They were approached by a French gentleman who wanted to buy the car (no idea why), and offered his current car as a part-ex.
When it turned out the Frenchman was offering a Ferrari 250 GTO, my dad and his mate jumped at the opportunity, especially when the Frenchman started offering THEM cash to balance the deal!
The car was an ex Le Mans race car (allegedly it had finished 4th, maybe 4th in class?), and was still setup for that circuit…. with a long top gear and a special final-drive box, utterly irremovable spare wheel in the rear (the bodywork was assembled around the spare!), and, best of all, a big wooden knob on the dash, which, when struck would start the Fiamm horn blaring: BLART BLART BLART BLART, until hit a second time.
At the time Dad and his mate used to help out the London Ferrari concessionaire at various club-races when they weren’t racing themselves, so figured they might get some cheap parts if required.
Apparently they had great fun chasing E-Types with “bright young things” behind the wheel out onto the M1, where they would hit the horn : BLART BLART BLART…
until the E-type was flat out and pulled aside, giving up the “race”.
At which point the Ferrari would be guided out into the “fast” lane, pull up alongside (at 150-ish mph), and casually change up into top gear and accelerate away. 😀 😀 (The GTO being good for at least 180mph in Le Mans trim).
They didn’t hold onto the car for long because it turned out that swapping the gears for those more suitable for short-circuit racing, and any repairs required in the event of “incidents” would be far, far too expensive. 🙁
Neat story, I’m guessing it was either 3757GT (LHD) or 4399GT (RHD).
Wonderful.
Thanks for your perspective, Adrian. A fascinating look at the difference between appearance and design. I can believe the early E-Type convertible looks good while agreeing that as a piece of design work it’s all over the place … and the fixed-heads are just ungainly no matter the generation.
Highest compliment I can give: I read it all the way to the end.
I try to entertain my readers as I educate them.
I appreciate that your comments echo the ones Frank Stephenson made in his video. I don’t quite agree with his final version, but it’s neat to see. https://youtu.be/Vq1EEwwfAmc?si=5e37BfQfN8cEYi-W
Lots of widely accepted as beautiful cars have the same problems. Look up a ’56 Ford F100. Knee knocker doors, very round windshield, non-converging pillar/window lines…
This is what I hate about “rules” when it comes to totally subjective things like design an appearance. I’m guessing this is where you’ll rant at me that it’s not as subjective as I say, and these rules exist for good reason. But the fact you dislike this design, while the vast majority don’t, is proof enough otherwise.
Great rant.
I own nothing by the Beatles. My favourite non-racing Jag is an XJC, followed by, ooh. Just that one Jag. I kind of like the F-Type, but I can’t separate it’s visual appeal from it’s likely reliability. Plus it looks heavy, which it is.
I hate the E-Type’s inset wheels as it’s terrible engineering, I love the louvres in the bonnet (I just love louvres), and the rest of it is meh. I can forgive the terrible detailing because it’s old, so that leaves me with grand total of meh.
I could not have expressed my opinions better than your post. Are we twins?
Have you seen Harry’s Garage where Harry Metcalfe has his 12-cylinder XKC restored and restomodded with a manual transmission?
Harry Metcalfe’s Restored Jaguar XJC V12 is a Dream Machine – JaguarForums
Good link, thanks!
Came here for an article on the Lamborghini Miura and he just talked about some Jaguar the whole time…..
Miura is nice for sure. Then you find out the pipes sticking out the back aren’t even connected to the exhaust system to allow the rear clamshell to open. Clever solution, but another solution might have worked better without the compromise.
Those Miura pipes were ahead of their time. Now most cars have fake tips built into the bumpers.
True, though at least the bull’s pipes had function, they weren’t entirely decorative.
Fake pipes are a trend that shouldn’t have happened.
Muiras are apparently terrible to drive as well.
Id love to find out for myself!
Beauty and art are in the eye of the beholder.
As an old, I recall the Beatles albums being released. I followed their journey from the simplistic “Love Me Do” to the psychedelic an bizarre “Revolution #9”. So perhaps it is with a dose of nostalgia, but following them as a kid I saw them transform over in real time. Unapologetic lover of the Beatles. They were a contrast to most of what was out there at the time.
As far as the E-type, I loved it then and I love it still. To say that you “hate” it (and the Beatles) is a bit haughty IMHO. I fell in love with the E-Type when I first saw one up close in glorious BRG at Larz Anderson Auto Museum in Brookline MA on British Car Day. Yeah, it has some quirky proportions, and a curvy windshield but, hell, THAT’S what made it sexy af.
After seeing it at the auto show, we got back on the road surrounded by 70s Darts and Caprices and the occasional Pinto. Context is everything.
In the photo of the production line, I believe that you can see the cloaked backside of Lucas, Prince of Darkness, supervising the installation of the wiring harness and all electrical components…
My biggest complaint with the E was the failure to follow the dip in the body with a parallel dip in the window opening. I can almost forgive the A pillar rake. Up here in the lake effect road salt belt, British cars didn’t last long anyway. This was a great era for design, with the BMW 507, MB 300SL, Alfa Duetto imports and the Stingrays.
That would look weird, and window sealing wasn’t as good in those days so it probably would have leaked.
Shelby daytona coupe, now that is a pretty car.
I am absolutely delighted to hear a professional designer/goth-uncle rag on this overrated piece of feces. I always thought the e-type would look so much prettier with a lower roof line and something done to solve that horrible side profile.
Have you seen Frank Stephenson’s nicely-done video on it? https://youtu.be/Vq1EEwwfAmc?si=5e37BfQfN8cEYi-W
No,but I think I will. Thanks.
In a world where the Miura and the Toyota 2000GT exists, I have never understood why the E-Type keeps finding itself at the top of list of ‘the most beautiful car’. It’s not even the most beautiful Jaguar! And apart from a handful of songs, everything the Beatles ever wrote can go straight in the bin.
Same reason some folks think that modern apple devices are great designs (they aren’t), perhaps? Popularity and widespread awareness doesn’t change the truth, despite what folks might say.
I try to stay away from talking about Apple because it’s such a cliche. But they do take design very seriously. Product wise they’ve lost their way a bit post-Jobs, but in most things (products, website, retail environments, packaging) they put a lot of thought and care into what they do and are a clear cut above most consumer electronic experiences.
I also try to avoid bringing them up, but I was starved for a common visual touchpoint, so went for the low-hanging fruit (pun intended).
I don’t disagree that they put effort into their products, but I don’t see them as a paragon of “good” design. Rehashed Dieter Rams concepts with Ive’s tweaks forcing form to compromise function negates many of the positive qualities they have had.
I agree that they’ve lost that plateau they were on, but by the same token they seem to have gone back to form. They rode the bubble and profited very handsomely from it, but – like most – were unable to make a lasting and repetitive impact in the same way(s). One can only be groundbreaking so many times before the ‘garden’ is just a jumble of mole hills.
After having to buy a Windows laptop a couple of years ago, out of economic necessity after 25 years or so of Macs, I will never buy another Windows machine.
Meh. Jobs famously said design is how something works, not how it looks–or maybe it’s apocryphal, but w/e it makes a good point: a lot of Apple product designs have been all look and no function. Ive left to his own devices proved to be a shit designer obsessed with looks and not function. Examples abound (laptop with only one port, killing all non-USB-C ports including the SD card slot professionals have been relying on for work for years, mouse that only charges upside down, pencil that only charges in the iPad’s anus, pretty white cables that get grungy and fray because they’re too thin and the charger design forces them to bend too far, extreme thinness leading to the worst keyboard ever made and constant video cable failure, their generally atrocious peripherals, etc ad infinitum).
A boring black Thinpad is better at being a computer than most Mac laptops.
Apple has had some brilliant designs here and there (the iPhone changed the world, not just the phone world) and deserves credit for forcing the whole industry to step up their game, but their hit ratio isn’t nearly as high as their braggadocio would suggest. They’re better at bragging about their design accomplishments than about their actual accomplishments.
They have got some things wrong agreed (touchbar, butterfly keyboards) but they usually course correct (and a lot of those fuck ups came post Jobs).
it takes me one click to connect my Bluetooth speaker to my MacBook.
it takes four in Windows 11.
Yeah that’s fair, when they nail a use case they’re unbeatable.
I lost interest in Apple back in the days of Mac+. I like things I can fix and upgrade. Apple is anything but that so while I give them credit for being slick IMO they absolutely suck when it comes to design where it matters to me.
I’ll admit there was a brief time iPhones intrigued me but then Apple abandoned swappable batteries. That’s a dealbreaker.
Yes they’re not good for upgrading yourself, but the reality is that’s not most consumers. The RAM is particularly egregious, especially for someone who likes a lot of RAM (Photoshop loves it – I’ve got 32gb in my Dell G7).
But for most consumers they’d rather have the slimmer chassis.
“But for most consumers they’d rather have the slimmer chassis”
Folks who just do word processing, light spreadsheets and internet porn I think would be fine with a 5 yo smartphone in a docking station.
… I don’t hate that III series with a hard top.
That was a good breakdown, the is Adrian. I’ve never liked this car, or understood why it’s supposed to be the epitome of car design, especially when you have things like the Parsh 356, or any Mercedes SL from the 1950s to the 1990s. Also the pre-facelift XJS V12 is just as pretty as the E type. Fite me.
The jagyuah looks like a shoe Chaplin’s tramp wears.
The Beatles were the Maroon Five of their era.
Get really high and listen to Songs About Jane on a good stereo. Stop when you get to the live shit on the B-side.
I like that record and was reminded of the band’s existence recently. So I checked out their newer stuff, and evidently they have completely eliminated any rock or grit and replaced it with pretty lame affected pop? That made me sad. No shade on pop music, there’s a lot of good stuff out there, but Maroon 5 is more like Marooned 5.
I still think the Miura is the best design ever, but a whole lot of people, including myself, see the beauty in the Jag. It may be a bad ‘design’ to you, but it somehow still works. Some of it is in the finer points, like the original open mouth and the wire wheels, as evidenced by the later Series III, so some design credit should go there. However even the IIIs still have those gorgeous fenders lines. You also seem to take great exception to the phallic nature of the design while also noting the it was a byproduct of the engineering rather than by intention. In my mind it is an excellent compromise of form and function. Perhaps you might want to go a little easier on it?
The Beatles? I can totally get not liking everything they did, but hating everything? Their work varied so much from beginning to end that it’s rather surprising you hate it all. Also, George Martin is aces in my book.
“Jaguar claimed a top speed of 150 mph when the typical asthmatic family sedan of the time would struggle to gasp its way much past seventy. Jaguar’s top speed claims might have been exaggerated but it didn’t matter. You were not going faster at any price.”
My 1960 TR-3 with crappier aerodynamics managed to kiss 100 mph* on the straight and level with but a 105 HP 2.1L I4 engine from a Ferguson tractor or agricultural water pump depending on which story you believe.
*more with an overdrive
Is your TR3 a ‘typical family sedan’?
And why wasn’t I raised in that family?
If you haven’t held onto the roll bar for dear life as you gleefully swing your 9 yo body over the side as mom whips a corner you haven’t lived!
Riding on the back deck like the king of a parade through the neighborhood was fun too.
Hey, it was the 70s. Kids were kinda expendable back then.
“Is your TR3 a ‘typical family sedan’?”
As far as low power and lousy aerodynamics go yes.
It was also my mom’s way to haul around three kids so also yes.
About water pumps, I know an interesting story, told to me firsthand: A friend of mine had bought a new or newish Ford Torino, during a time when an American vehicle on European roads was an absolute rarity. There were exceptions like Sweden (I think), but in most European countries, and American car was totally unaffordable, thanks to taxes in relation to engine size and much higher fuel prices.
Either way, his water pump seized while on vacation in Italy, in the middle of the night on his way back to Switzerland (long before cellphones were a thing). The tow truck driver didn’t know of any Ford dealers nearby, so he just towed him to the closest shop he knew, which happened to be an independent little shop, specializing in tractors and other motorized agricultural equipment. Would you know it, the guy managed to install a water pump that he had in his workshop, obviously from a tractor, and within an hour he was back on the road. Obviously he swapped it out for an original one soon after , but it had worked fine for at least 500 miles of non-stop highway driving.
Ford made tractors too so it was probably the same part.
Now that you mention it, I do remember the odd Ford Tractor seeing on a farm, when I was a kid. One older farmer told me that he had one with an automatic gearbox with lockable gears, which was a huge advantage (a tractor’s clutch pedal feels nothing like a Miata clutch, pressing and releasing it all day is hard work). But just like with passengers cars, automatic gearboxes only started being accepted very late in Europe. Main reason probably being that before the 2000s, a 4 cylinder car was just too weak for a ‘traditional’ auto box. (planetary gears and torque converter).
Ford has been making tractors for over 100 years:
https://www.motorcities.org/story-of-the-week/2017/the-early-years-of-ford-tractors-1907-1961
Henry Ford was a farmer at heart and one of his dreams was to make farm work suck less. The mass produced tractor was a huge step towards that goal.
Very few people have any idea at all how important the tractor was for the 20th century. One single farmer (or a couple of them) with a good tractor and the right attachments can do stuff all on its own in an hour or two, where it previously took a dozen man for a day (at least). As a simple example, just think about mowing…
They’re important for the 21st century too. Without tractors 6-7B people (and who knows how many animals) are gonna starve.
The ability to hit 100mph was a Triumph selling point iirc. No speed limits in those days.
The aero lift at those speeds was your limit.
You haven’t lived until you’ve wondered why the steering is having no effect in your ’79 Thunderbird at better than 90.
“You haven’t lived until…”
Funny, I say the same about surfing a king sized mattress strapped to the hood of a softly purring Lincoln Mk IV as it slowly makes its way through a dark, single lane forest dirt road, the headlights unseen under the mattress lighting the way ahead.
Truly a magical experience.
I was late for a flight. Sounds like you were doing a different kind of flying.
Nah. Just moving day in the boonies.
I think the succeeding XJS (Euro lights only) is the much prettier car. All hail the new(er) Queen. Had to say it. Feels good af.
Hear, hear! Finally someone of some authority can back me up on this. While I don’t hate the soft-top E-Types, the shape of the fixed-roof versions has always seemed like a gawky attempt at grace.
The most obvious offender is that scrotal blob of a cabin. Coupled with the undeniably penile forward section, it goes for sex appeal by aiming entirely below the belt. It is an interesting paradox… the car has a feminine softness despite its suggestive shape.
I hate the tucked wheels. Daintily hidden in their unflared wells, they lack the sporting character that would develop as a functional outgrowth of racing. Cars like the AC Ace got wider tires and bulkier arches to accommodate them, morphing into the more steroidal 427 Cobra. I’m not saying that a more elegant, less muscular design language is inferior, but in the realm of sports cars, consumers haven’t been too kind to delicate designs. The mass-market vehicles that resulted from the need for speed kindled by the E-Type’s era were, in the U.S. at least, called musclecars – not just for their powertrains but because of their styling as well.
One thing that’s gone unsaid in this discussion is the E-Type’s torpedo shape, specifically the way its lower edges roll under in emulation of an airplane’s fuselage. Combined with the prim wheels, this makes it look like a child’s pedal car. I understand that this was not abnormal in period, but as someone who cut their teeth on cocaine-era design elements like the side strakes of a Testarossa, the boxy vents of a Countach, or the turbine wheels and ridged skirts of a Fox-body 5.0, the “beautiful” Jag looks like a nerd wearing pegged highwater jeans. As with the wheels and wells, this is not just an aesthetic gripe: The late-80s to early-90s penchant for egregious body cladding resulted from a newfound interest in “ground effects” after we discovered that having a lot of air flowing under a car does it no favors.
Good form really does follow improved function. A car that looks like a sausage on wheels embodies a design that is uselessly idiosyncratic. I realized this most painfully when I finally saw a Miura in the sheetmetal. The way it disappeared under itself and sat pinched on those deeply inset wheels… I felt like I’d met a hero I shouldn’t have. I was almost ashamed of myself as I sidled over to a wedgy, bulky, vent-strewn 288 GTO and thought “now THIS…”
Even though I disagree with almost everything you wrote here, you do rise an interesting point: the ‘inset’ wheels. If you look at cars from this era, you’ll notice that this was a real trend, not just a Jaguar thing. At the time, it seemed futuristic to ‘hide’ the wheels, some cars (mostly concept cars, but still) went as far as trying to create an impression of a ‘floating’ car, which was probably to prepare people for the next generation of cars, which would be flying cars (haha), hence there was no need for wheels anymore.
Sometimes around the end of the 80s, big, bold wheels started to appear, first on high end cars, later through the entire line up.
As far as preferences go, I actually hate this modern trend of huge wheels. I miss the times when they were ‘hidden’ under the car.
True – the trend of a “floating” aerospace-inspired aesthetic does seem to have been a recurring design language then, a sleeker, more UFO-like look than the fins, cones, and other pointy bits of primarily American jet-age cars. The Citroen DS is a great example, especially the auto show displays that did away with the wheels entirely, making it seem like it could achieve flight.
Interestingly, despite what the author says, the press didn’t go nuts of the E-types looks when it came out. Press was somewhat ambivalent about it. “Opinions differ about the general appearance of the car, but it is generally striking from any angle, particularly from the rear”. Road and Track Jaguar E-type 4.2 Coupe road test.
They were nuts about the performance, especially at the price, basically what was a LeMans winner a few short years ago come down to earth for popular consumption.
I have been less than kind towards the author’s sentiments, but to some extent I get it. We mostly desire the things we coveted when young but couldn’t quite reach reach, couldn’t quite afford. I don’t get the love the ’57 Chevy gets, it looks like most any other frumpy ’50s American car to me, but the generation before me obviously sees something in them I don’t. Different taste and changing tastes from generation to generation.
There’s plenty of sixties stuff I do like, so it’s not necessarily an age thing. Music obviously nothing good came before 1976.
And I like some things older than the fifties and even a select few cars designed in this decade. I don’t have numbers, but I am very comfortable saying you ask somebody over fifty about their idea of most beautiful car or favorite band or song they are not going to say anything recent, and are much more likely to pick something from when they were in their 30s or younger.
It is often referred to as nostalgia, but I call it imprinting, where ideas of beauty are formed at an early age and eventually get hard wired to the point where newer stuff generally doesn’t really appeal, or if it does it often has retro elements.
On the music front Kenny Loggins had a break out year in ’76, but wild guess you may be skewing more towards the Clash or Ramones end of things.
As usual I was being facetious to make a point, but I do think nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake is a folly. My love of Modernism and Brutalism is based partly on their spirit of optimism and having a clear ideology to improve things, rather than wearing rose tinted glasses.
Too much modern culture and design falls into this post-modern trap of pandering (Stanger Things, synthwave music etc) which I’ve ranted about ad nauseam.
A lot of technical designer “principles” cited to try to say a beautiful car isn’t. The fact that Corvettes and 911s evolved and the E-TYPE didn’t is relevant if you want to compare a C4 Corvette to an XJS, but that is not the game we are playing here.
Getting away from the various bad takes on the car, I grew up in the 60s, born the same year the E-type was hatched. My theory on cars and music and ideas of beauty in general is that your taste is imprinted when you are young. I lust after Muiras and E-types and Alfa GTVs and BMW 3.0CSs, but the modern supercar look just does nothing for me.
I also love the Beatles and still listen to them, not because it is the easy answer, but because I truly enjoy their music. Rhythm and harmonies (no one did it better) appeal to me a lot more than the “how loud and long can you sing” thing going on with most modern music.
Clickbait worthy of Jalopnik.
Also, how can the author not see the irony in starting a piece with : ‘One of the crucial attributes for a car designer to possess is the ability to separate what they personally like, from what customers like’, and then proceeds to educate the unwashed masses about what they should like. Forget about your taste, if a designer tells you it’s crap, shut up and agree with him. After all, he has studied on not just any college, but the royal college (the ‘r’ is intentional, I have no respect for that kind of stuff).
This. If millions of people like something you don’t, they probably have valid reasons for it, and it should be enough to just say “it’s not my thing, but you do you.” But noooo, if you went to Design School, then Smart Teacher’s Opinion On What Is Good Design is gospel and everyone else must be wrong…
That’s exactly what I meant. If you have to be A Designer to appreciate its beauty, then it has failed.
To me, that sounds like this thing you hear sometimes, ‘you have to get used to it’. Sure you can get used to ugliness, especially if it’s a trend and everything else is just as ugly, or worse. But why would you want to?
Eh, the appeal to popular success is kind of bankrupt reasoning, because by that metric then the Big Mac is a paragon of gastronomy and Justin Bieber a musician for the ages.
There’s more to it than that, and I think it’s good that sacred cows of any kind should be evaluated with a modicum of detachment from their historical or generational context. Whether you agree with the evaluation is up to you, but I don’t think dismissing Adrian’s approach and sort-of-hot takes is fair. In fact, the very popularity of this car’s design should make it more, not less, subject to scrutiny–there isn’t much to learn by dissecting a 1982 Zastava.
I see your point, but (I think) the analogy with the Big Mac makes no sense whatsoever. Nobody has ever claimed that the Big Mac (or any other fast food product) is particularly tasty, healthy, or beautifully presented. It’s a basic burger that’s supposed to do one thing only: provide people with inexpensive calories. And by that metric, it is indeed a huge success. Just like J. Bieber or the Spice Girls (for those of us who remember them): all they wanted was to sell as many records as possible, they knew they weren’t gonna be considered musical geniuses (or at least those who produced them, knew it).
Popular and good are two different characteristics.
Do you know for sure that’s what motivated bieber? And do you know for sure the Jag’s designer’s goal was to be considered a design genius?
Yes I’m pretty sure that Mr. Bieber wanted to sell as many records as possible. If not, he could have A) not recorded them, or B), even once those were made(recorded), he could have just NOT sold them, or sold them in a way to not make a profit. And even if all these things have happened without him agreeing to it, he is now an adult, and if actually regrets it, he can either create a charity or give all his money to the church or to Scientology. Both of them would gladly accept, I’m sure.
I don’t know much about the guy who’s responsible for the E-type design, but wasn’t he the owner of Jaguar at that time ? A certain Mr. Lion, if im not mistaken. So if that’s more or less true, I think it’s pretty clear that he wanted to sell his cars, if possible enough of them to keep on living a lavish lifestyle. After all, no one likes to skip the weekly fox hunt for lack of funds, right? Or is it just me?
Did you actually read and understand the piece? Because that’s exactly what I said.
Reading comprehension not your strong point is it?
If I wanted to make it personal (like you just did), I’d answer that good design doesn’t seem to be yours…
You disrespected my experience and qualifications, and totally misrepresented what I actually said in the article.
First, let me sincerely apologize if I hurt your feelings. I shouldn’t have done it, it’s stupid and even though you surely wanted to provoke reactions, you must have massively underestimated it. Unfortunately it’s the internet, and even a new-ish site can have hundreds or even thousands of comments within hours. And most of these commenters aren’t shy about their opinions (just like you). Love or hate it (which seems to be your case), but at least it’s raw and honest feedback. I’m not gonna pretend that it is easy to take, on the other hand you can’t expect your readers to lie just to protects your feelings.
But because of all that, I re-read the entire article, and I took quite some time to write this comment, to make myself clear(er), hopefully without insulting anyone.
I’ll use two examples (quotes) that struck me as particularly interesting/revealing, and I don’t think I’m using them out of context. If you think so, I’m sincerely sorry.
There we go…:,if I’m reading sentences like ‘A healthy dash-to-axle ratio is something that idiots think defines how good a car looks’, or ‘Forget figuratively, it is literally a dick on wheels. Part of me can’t help feeling that part of the E-Type’s enduring appeal to the male enthusiast is that deep down in the lizard part of their brain, they think it will make them irresistible.’, I think I can reasonably deduct a couple of things:
First, you seem to think you’re smarter than most people: who else would treat a random group of people as idiots? (Other than trolls, of course). The funny thing about that is that I have yet to hear a quote from a real genius (like Einstein or S. Hawking) mocking people for their (lack of) intelligence. These statements are always, without exception, made by people who are full of themselves, totally lack self-awareness and are oftentimes surrounded by Yes-men. Since I don’t know you personally, I can only go by what I’m reading, and judging by that, I’d have to put you in the latter category. But at this point, it’s obviously just a conjecture. So if I’m wrong, I apologize.
The second part is your obsession with genitalia, particularly dicks. Of course cars have always been associated with sexual themes, that’s nothing new, but if you actually think that this car is or looks like a dick on wheels, you clearly haven’t seen one (a penis), ever, except your own (I guess). And if yours looks like an E-type without wheels, I would consider surgery, seriously.
Joking aside though, I think the number of times you use the word dick (or a synonym) would probably break a record, for an article about car design, if there was such a record. And I honestly wonder why? There’s plenty of low-slung cars with long bonnets, and the easiest way to criticize them is to say that they’re a phallic symbol (and usually it’s implied that only people with small penisses would want such a car. And if it’s not just implied, there are usually a few sentences about it, just to make it clear to everyone). And you definitely didn’t hold back with the penis analogies. Unfortunately, they are old, worn-out, lame and just not funny. But I will concede that this is purely a matter of taste, and there might be people out there who find it so funny that they can’t help but spitting their morning coffee all over their keyboard, whenever somebody compares a big car/bonnet/engine to a penis.
I could go on, quoting other parts and dissecting them, but I hope I made my point.
Or in completely different words: if the car looks beautiful to so many people, you can be pretty sure that they absolutely DO BOT CARE if the angles of the different pillars do not correspond to what’s written in some ‘Design-Bible’.
I wasn’t so much hurt as insulted. I sacrificed a lot personally to gain my qualifications and gain employment in a field that is incredibly hard to succeed in. I don’t take umbrage at much, but that always touches a nerve. So thank you and I accept your apology.
The point I was trying to make in the article, is that the E-Type is popular, but as a piece of design it’s problematic. Despite that, it’s still engaging and appeals to a lot of people. However it’s not for me and it’s for the reasons I explained. Some of that is personal, but some is based in reality.
As for calling people idiots, I see a lot of uninformed car design commentary across the internet, and for the most part creators and commenters don’t know what they’re talking about. Was it a glib comment? Yes but the point stands and I can take a much more offhand and slightly humorous and sarcastic tone here than I can at Hagerty. Regular readers will hopefully have gotten used to my voice by now.
if not stick around and be prepared to be insulted some more. 😛
I do find it interesting that of the two major critiques I made (complete with quotes from the original article), you only seem to have read the part with the apology. Yes you also briefly mentioned the idiot part, basically confirming what I said (you’re so much smarter than all these idiots, and somehow you feel that’s a valid reason to sh* on them). About this, I will just repeat my original point: if someone is actually considerably smarter than the average citizen, they are always, or let’s say in 99.9% of cases, humble about it and would never treat people as idiots just because they feel superior. Maybe it’s because they don’t feel superior? On the contrary, really smart people are usually cool and collected, and confident enough that they don’t have to treat others from a high horse. And calling other people idiots is definitely in that category, like it or not. Even if you later add that you didn’t really mean it. Honestly, I think a little self awareness would go a long way. Or you can keep on listening to those whose professional futur is in your hands. That way, you can be sure to continue getting compliments, and lots of it – not just about your work, but also what a cool guy you are. That’s fine, ‘you do you’ as they say, but with this kind of attitude, eg living in your bubble where everything you think or say is gospel, you can only hope (or pray, if you’re religious) that reality will never ever come crashing down on you. It would be a very hard awakening, I’m quite sure about that.
“And the E-Type does break a couple of what we would now consider cardinal car design rules, but by gets away with it through sheer chutzpah”
The whole point of the article was that ‘it’s not for me, and here’s why. But other people do like it’.
Thank you, I was a little harsh, and I apologize. I am usually the see both sides guy, but my love for the E knows no bounds. I have a little more reasoned and nuanced take down the road here (ok, just looked I guess it is before this one) a bit. I do appreciate you posting pictures of the most beautiful car in the world, even if broken up with lines and comments 🙂
You can go to the Jaguar media site and see the unannotated versions.
Well… I’m neither here nor there with that design…. however Adrian, you made one large mistake. You tried to make shoving a locomotive of a straight six into a very small car like a bad idea. Long live locomotivesque straight sixes
Best troll post ever.
Should’ve just lead with “it’s a footballer’s car, so naturally I must hate it” and left it at that.
I love football. I also appear to love irony.
The E-type is the gold standard for post war car design. It’s like Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. It’s beautiful, it’s haunting, it sounds like nothing that came before, it speaks to people. You put it on in the record shop and everybody who walks in goes, “What’s that you’re playing?” What I’m saying is we disagree on the E-type.
I will now sell five copies of The Three E.P.s by The Beta Band.