The 1955-1959 Jaguar 2.4 and 3.4-Litre cars retroactively called
Mark 1 Jaguars boasted one of William Lyon's very best designs. Well, that's my opinion: loved them from the first time I saw one.
More than 40 years later while Ford owned Jaguar, the 1999-2008
S-Type was created. Although in the year-2000 design mode, it was given Retro features evoking the successful Mark 1 design and its strong historical Jaguar image.
I really liked it too, even though it was criticized by some who thought it should have been pathbreaking rather than Retro. Since then, all that traditional Jaguar styling language has been abandoned, possibly to the brand's detriment. But that's a story for another occasion.
Today's post compares the two designs so as to show how much classic styling was retained, and how much was generic year-2000 practice.
In the comparison below, the Mark 1 car was listed for sale on the Internet. The S-Type photos are via England's Car and Classic Auctions.
Gallery
The Mark 1. Characteristics include a V-plan hood, vertical rounded-off grille, headlights mounted inboard of the fenders and settings for fog lights closer to the grille than the headlights are.
The S-Type. The main Retro carryovers can be seen here. Grille has a similar shape, but not as tall -- a chin air intake makes up for that. Four frontal lights, the larger ones placed close-to, but not at the fender edges. The plan-view V shape on the hood is subtly sculpted, and the hood itself is essentially car-width.
The Mark 1 body sculpting abaft of the headlight assemblies is echoed here, but related to the inner lamps.
The S-type's wheelbase is 114.5 inches (2908 mm), that of the Mark 1 is 107.5 inches (2730 mm). Respective lengths are 193.4 inches (4913 mm) and 181 inches (4597 mm). The tuck at the after edge of the rear side window is echoed here. Not the same profile, yet the Mark 1 spirit is evoked.
Almost no carryover at the rear due to packaging and aerodynamic considerations.
The S-Type's backlight window is more rounded than angular, so that's sort of a similarity to the Mark 1's.
Note the classic Jaguar tucked-down passenger compartment's aft end and the greenhouse's comparatively short length. The car and its seating details are taller than on the S-Type.
Like most 2000-vintage cars, the S-Type's shape resulted from some wind tunnel testing in reaction to government fuel economy regulations. So its side view contains no Retro items worth noting aside from that mentioned earlier.
Conclusion: The Retro part of the design is almost entirely found on the S-Type's from end. And largely due to the grille and lights.
Speaking of non-retro Jaguars I walked by a parked last XJ yesterday, looked at it from every angle, and once again decided that yes, that's still the one cool high end luxury car in the past decade or two.
ReplyDeleteThe modern S was let down a bit by several details but not bad (like the later Ford RetroBird was - the old cues just did not work, at least not the way they were employed). The worst to me was always the slot carved into the side - it cheapens the design.
A few of the other lesser sins: the small grille seems like a single nostril. No one wants that. It should have been bigger to get beyond that and probably more vertical. The C pillar should have been wider and the rear window needs trim matching the side windows. A close call overall though. The revised dashboard is way better than the cheaper looking original.