The Mysterious, Elusive 1961 Pontiac Astra Concept Car

Below are two photos of a 1961 Pontiac design probably under consideration for the 1963 model year.  Before late September 2021, I had neither heard of it nor had seen pictures of it.  Search engines have turned up essentially nothing other than the images.  My personal reference library is unfortunately sketchy regarding Pontiac, so that was no help.

Part of the Internet confusion might be because Pontiac did market a model called the Astre, and that might confuse search engines.

That said, let's look at those photos.

Gallery

This is a four-door hardtop sedan (no B-pillar above the belt line).  Rear doors are supposedly hinged at the rear, same as Ford's new 1961 Continental.  But there are no actual cut lines, so there are no actual doors on the right side of this styling model.  A vestige of Pontiac's Silver Streaks can be seen forward of the front wheel opening.  Windshield framing is unusual because the upper corners are sharp and the lower ones are rounded.  Body sides are puffed out to help accommodate the brand's new Wide Track axle width stance.  The dramatic sculpting around the headlight assemblies harkens to Pontiac's recently developed paired grille theme (note images of production car grilles below).

The Astra's rear is also somewhat quirky -- namely the central copped-down fin on the trunk lid.  From this photo, it's hard to tell where the tail lights are.  Maybe in the interior folds of the fenders.  The "people" in the model are actually mannequins, something quite rare on full-scale models.  That is, in the top image the woman in the front seat is gesturing.  She also is gesturing in the above photo that was probably taken a little later than the first one because the turntable was rotated 180 or so degrees (compare shadows and backgrounds).

All things considered, the Astra is an interesting design that might have been produced if its details were less exaggerated and it had more practical bumpers and such.

A 1963 Pontiac Bonneville Vista Sedan, the kind of production car being investigated by Astra and other Pontiac designs in 1960 or even early 1961.  The rear fenders, backlight window and C-pillar are not much different from those items on the Astra.

The front of a 1959 Pontiac Catalina showing the two-piece grille design that first appeard on Pontiacs that model year.

Rounded-frame two-piece grilles did not reappear until the 1961 compact Pontiac Tempest was launched.  Other Pontiacs in the 1960-61 time frame had grille designs more removed from the Asta's theme.