I was tooling around downtown Detroit during President’s Day weekend last month when this mildly customized, first-year Chevy Monte Carlo approached the intersection of Grand River Avenue and Bagley Street next to the Michigan Building. The green color of its custom paint job reminded me of that of Hi-C Ecto Cooler, one of my favorite soft drinks from childhood. I understand that opinions are sharply divided as to the appeal of the “donk” treatment of classic American cars. Regardless of whether you stand on the “pro” or “con” side of that debate, I think both this Monte and the Michigan Building in the background are fitting examples of adaptive reuse.
What does one do when presented with the challenge of reusing something that is decayed or wrecked beyond its original purpose? Do you scrap it or tear it down, or do you find another way to preserve some of its elements and create something beautiful and/or useful in the eyes of some? The Michigan Building was built in 1925, originally housing the Michigan Theater. Once the theater closed in the mid-70’s, the tenants in the office portion of the building at the time threatened to move out unless they were provided parking. The solution? To gut the decaying and abandoned theater and turn it into a three-story parking garage, keeping its rotted-but-original, ornate ceiling. You might have seen footage of its haunting beauty in the 2002 film “8 Mile” which starred Detroit native son Eminem.
Coincidentally, this theater was built on the site of the garage where Henry Ford had built his first automobile. Hopefully, those of us who plan to attend the Annual CC Meetup in Detroit this June will be able to see this rebuilt garage, which was transplanted to the Henry Ford Museum in nearby Dearborn. Hank’s old garage may not exactly be another example of “adaptive reuse”, as it sits in a museum complex, but applause must be given to those in charge of seeing to it that this small part of American automotive history was preserved, instead of merely demolished.
As for this Monte Carlo (with SS badges which may be real or inauthentic – who really cares?), who is to say it was not brought back to this shiny, toy-like condition and appearance after being a rotted, rusted hulk sitting up on blocks in someone’s backyard? Some were up in arms with the recent destruction of a “Dukes Of Hazzard”-styled 1969 Dodge Charger R/T that was recently jumped on a ramp in Detroit, near Cobo Center, as part of the 65th annual Autorama showcase.
Doing a bit of research, I discovered that this donor Charger was in unsalvageable condition prior to receiving enough cosmetic brushing-up (which included duct tape standing in for chrome trim) to make it look like a passably nice facsimile. (Driver Raymond Kohn is the man… you should Google the footage.) Our featured Monte Carlo appears to have at least been given the full treatment of its owner’s loving vision. Perhaps with buildings as with automobiles (and in some cases, entire cities), sometimes a complete rethink and reinvention is the key to long-term survival… in any form.
Downtown Detroit, Michigan.
Sunday, February 19, 2017.
Related reading:
What fascinates me most about this shot is how a younger generation seems to understand the early Monte Carlo in a way almost completely opposite its intended mission. While the Mopar B and E body cars came in day-glow colors and tried to be “hip” and “mod”, the new Monte Carlo was the polar opposite – usually seen in muted colors with a vinyl roof and often with fender skirts and color-keyed wheelcovers.
Chevy figured out where the market was going while Chrysler was milking a flash-market that was pretty much over by 1970. But none of that matters to the guy who found a Monte and created the kind of Challenger he thinks Chevy should have built.
It goes to reenforce my point in yesterday’s personal luxury comparison, there’s nothing that fundamentally different in execution between these first gen Monte Carlos/GP than the Dodge Charger. They mostly were marketed different, and obviously younger generations(myself included) were never effected by that, or witnessed the different buyer demographic. What they see is a car that can be built to be as sporty as a Chevelle but with classier styling. The B-bodies often came in muted colors shod with vinyl tops originally too, lots of golds, browns, pale greens and maroon reds, as a bit of a purist it’s always a little jarring to me when I see a pre-1970 Mopars resprayed in sublime or plum crazy.
That’s a perceptive observation on the early Monte Carlo relative to the Dodge Charger. I could never quite pinpoint what it was about those early Monte Carlos that just didn’t sit right and I think you hit it. I’m not so sure it’s as clear-cut with the Grand Prix which had a lineage all the way back to 1962 in what would seem to be GM’s first effort to take on the same personal luxury market as the by then well-established Thunderbird. The only problem was the full-sized Grand Prix did not utilize unique sheetmetal like the T-bird. That wouldn’t happen until Buick debuted the stunning Riviera a year later.
The first Monte Carlo seems like a mostly personal luxury effort that, unlike the others, tried to cross over into the sporty demographic, in the same way the Charger was mostly a sporty car that had aspirations into the personal luxury market, simply because Chrysler couldn’t afford the R&D to come up with a specific personal luxury model that shared no sheetmetal with any of their other cars. I get the feeling that GM was hedging their bets with the first Monte Carlo, trying to get a feel for the market. When it became clear that performance was all but dead, the decision was quickly made to swing the Monte Carlo 100% to personal luxury for 1973.
The other, well-established personal luxury entries at the time (1969), while they might have had sporting pretensions with a few options, really were after the soft-riding, mushy-handling, comfy-cushion crowd. The Charger simply could never fit that demographic, particularly with the way Chrysler had Dodge into racing, particularly NASCAR.
In fact, I might go so far as to suggest that the Cordoba-based 1975 Charger was an exact clone of what GM had done with the 1970-72 Monte Carlo. It makes perfect sense with Chrysler’s standard follow-whatever-GM’s-doing corporate mission. Unfortunately for Chrysler, they didn’t grasp that the Charger’s lineage was sport, not luxury, and the Cordoba-Charger, unlike the first gen Monte Carlo, failed miserably.
It wasn’t until the second generation 1973 Monte Carlo that all pretense of ‘sporty’ was abandoned. OTOH, it’s worth noting that the fourth generation Monte Carlo did, indeed, compete in NASCAR and had a specific SS model with a body-color front end and rear spoiler.
I saw the Shinola sign in the background and I thought about this:
Not sure it’s on there, but go to YouTube and look for Todd Rundgren’s song SHINOLA…that’s what I think of.
That Slime Green paint must be dirt cheap as it seems as though 99% of these Donk-mobiles are that color.
+1, love the Utopia song, cheesy as it is!
Navin was a quick learner.
Donked-out MC? Phooey.
The 1970-72 Monte Carlos were the best.
I would only qualify this as Semi-Donk. “Real” donks have much larger wheels, and are usually raised to a ridiculously high ride height to be able to fit the wheels under the car. Here is a later version Monte Carlo with a donk vibe:
@JFrank: I was just about to comment on this. The article Monte is NOT a donk at all, it is just dechromed and painted in flourescent colors, with the current large wheels (or “rims” as they’re called). 🙂
An interesting car. Back in the day, seeing a pimped-out Grand Prix, Riviera, Eldorado, or even Toronado wasn’t that uncommon in an urban environment. But I can’t recall ever seeing a first generation Monte Carlo with the full-on JC Whitney treatment. Even though the sheetmetal was completely different, it seemed hard to shake the feeling that the early Monte Carlo was nothing more than a pretentious, rebodied Chevelle (which is exactly what it was).
Those first generation cars just didn’t seem to make the same bold styling statement as GM’s other division personal luxury cars. That wouldn’t happen until the much more dramatic 1973 car which was one of the better colonnade efforts.
This is NOT a donk. This has a lot more traits of restomod/pro-tourer in the Chip Foose variety.
I agree, with the rake and I’ll I’d call it a pro-tour restomod too.
I think guys and shows like Chip Foose ruin more cars than they “save”, but that’s just me.
I shudder to think if I still had my old ’64 Chevy, and Wifey decided to turn it over to them or someone similar for restoration, I’d lose my sanity over the result and cry like a baby and be ready to wring someone’s neck.
I strongly hate resto-mods.
I didn’t say I liked it, but I had to point out that distinction. I dislike the Foose look, and really hate the whole concept of the show Overhaulin as well. I don’t mind restomods though as long as the mods are not overtly obvious.
Agreed. The good thing is bringing this back to something that’s closer to the original concept is as easy as a paintjob and melting down those ugly rims so they don’t defile anything else.
ZM, youre 100% correct. I wouldn’t let Foose near a hotwheels car, let alone a real one. Slapping on oversized blinged out ugly wheels and a paintjob only 1994 could love seems to be his only game. Guess its better than letting classic iron rot, but better to do it right.
Needs to lose the pimp wheels and Earl Scheib paint job.
Yeah, but the paint job only cost $24.95…
Looks well done, a car it’s owner should be proud of. I realize the first gen Monte Carlo is basically a longer wheelbase and front end Chevelle, but the end result was a fine looking car. Not the color I’d choose, but I’m sure the owner likes it and that’s all that matters.
*In a nutshell.*
I agree with you (and the two commenters below).
I believe the last passenger car built in my hometown of Flint, Michigan was a ’70 Monte Carlo… That thought just crossed my mind.
Well, you have to drive what you dig.
I’m going to go on record as saying I don’t hate this. The wheels and color choices aren’t my first choice, but I actually like the 2-tone effect on this car, and I think the choice of color break lines along the top of the fender creases, etc. actually accentuates the lines of the car nicely. Like Joseph, I secretly hope that this car started out as a rather tattered and worn out example and was brought back to life in this way because of that. I’d hate to think of a relatively original car with decent chrome and undamaged panels being done up like this, but in Detroit I’d venture that there’s a fair amount of bondo hiding under that paint, and that those painted bumpers were likely pitted and scarred too badly to be presented in their original manner. From what we can see in these photos, the somewhat askew rear bumper alignment, slightly “lumpy” appearance of the front fender/ rocker area and the possibly sagging door serve to support this theory.
In any event, good for this guy for loving the car enough to put the work into it, and good for him for enjoying it.
Some great observations.
As regards my original idea of metaphors for adaptive reuse, I’ve attached a picture of the inside of the parking garage of the Michigan Building (credited to Anjana Schroeder of Crain’s), which should give some idea as to what the inside of the former theater / current parking garage looks like. I’ll just leave this here…
That’s the problem with Monte Carlos, a confused image’. GM could never figure out whether the car is supposed to represent brougham or NASCAR and some people still aren’t sure. So everyone is trying to remake their Monte into whatever they think will improve it, donk or hot rod or whatever, regardless whether it’s appropriate for their particular car.