Can’t ever get enough of the Citroen Ami 6. If you’re up to a bigger dose, head here.
Quality Control: Is It Ugly Enough?
– Posted on December 4, 2013
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Curbside Classics Archives
Can’t ever get enough of the Citroen Ami 6. If you’re up to a bigger dose, head here.
Whoo boy I have some repressed memories of those… my dad bought a brand new 1963 Ami6, Some of my earliest car memories revolve around riding in the back seat of that ugly blue spud. I think he got rid of it sometime in 1967 due to rust… surprise surprise. Wish I knew where the pics of it disappeared to…
They couldn’t have designed an uglier car if they tried. Icing on the cake is the reverse canted rear window.
The roof line looks like it was inspired by the Mercury Turnpike Cruiser.
Yes, but the Mercury’s was a “Breezeway Window” that retracted. This one didn’t. I can deal with ugliness if it serves some sort of purpose, but in the Ami it was pure affection. Ugliness for its own sake.
I sometimes wonder how often car stylists, industrial designers, and (especially) architects are just screwing with us, taunting us, daring us. For some, it seems to be a game of “How much hideousness can we inflict upon the public before they come after us with torches and pitchforks? You think your design was obnoxious? What till you see what I can do!”
The Ami fixed-window reverse slant DID have a purpose – it did away with the parcel shelf and put the entire trunk under the trunklid for easy access plus good rear headroom. The only way to beat it would be with a hatchback, which Renault brought with the R4 in the same class a couple years later
No parcel shelf? Then where do they put their Jerry Lewis bobbleheads?
Ugliest car ever made in my opinion, with the R10 running close behind.
I think they designed the hood by draping a sheet of croissant dough over the engine compartment.
Have you checked out the Ssangyong Stavic/Rodius caution: graphic content
Every Ami goes through a thorough baking process to make sure the ugly gets baked in.
Featuring bumpers by Schwinn…
Another car from my schooldays,an exchange French teacher drove one,can’t remember the year of the car.Those slanted rear windows had quite a spell on Lincolns and Mercuries,the British Ford Anglia and Classic(can’t remember the last time I saw one of those) and the Citroen and a few other cars I missed out.It’s got an attraction in the same way a French Bulldog has,so ugly it’s cute
Oh boy, these cars are so ugly they’re downright cool.
Ah the memories… actually my first memory in life (that I recall) involved an Ami – the one that was my father’s first car. And the said memory was this: the 2-year old me inquisitively touching the exhaust pipe after we arrived home one day – and found out it was hot. Ouch! So, the first thing in life that I remembered: exhaust pipes are hot (and on old French cars they are located on the side, not at the tail.)
are those woman working in a factory with open toed shoes?!!! Vive La France!
And wedge heels, no less…and shoes that are not securely attached at the heel…and skirts that are not tightly fitted, so as to avoid getting caught on moving machinery.
I’m normally pretty libertarian, but I have a healthy respect for sensible safety measures and gear in a factory setting.
Have we not met before messier?
Probably the office staff. “Pierre, let’s grab a publicity shot while the workers are on their wildcat walkout. Otherwise we’ll have to wait until next week’s strike!”
I love the ladies in the factory wearing dresses. Was there champagne in the break room as well?
Now we know where the Auction 3 Litre prototype got its headlights from.
I think in some ways the Citroen Ami 6 is the most French of French cars because it’s clear that the people who designed it really didn’t care what anybody thought about the car.
It could be worse.
Uh… I think that might be an improvement. If you can’t drive it, fewer people will see it.
And the view from the rear is just as, er, striking as from the front.
Maybe it’s because it seems stylistcally slightly related to the Saab 95 wagon my parents drove when I was a kid, but I really don’t mind it. It’s certainly no Aztek!
Strange how the French could come up with this ugly brute and beauties like the Citroen DS & SM and the Facel Vega
To me, this thing is so actively ugly that it becomes a work of art. Some cars make me want them by their off-the-charts weird-factor. This is one of them.
Beauty is skin deep, but ugly is right to the bone.
The car mings but the plastic parts tubs look modern.
First time I ever saw one was in a TINTIN comic. Thought the artist was really creative & it was several decades before I learned it was an actual car! (GRIN)