Photos from the Cohort by Jerome Solberg.
Three well-preserved GM faces, with some questionable makeup bits.
Cohort Pic(k)s Of The Day: Three GM Faces – Two Monte Carlos & One Cadillac
– Posted on June 8, 2024
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Curbside Classics Archives
I really try not to be too critical of easily removable modifications but LED/projector headlights shaped like rectangular or round halogens look awful and gross. I can understand the stripes as the Monte SS is spiritual ascendant of Chevelle SSs with them, but that present day technology nonsense fitted to old cars is just tacky. May as well superglue an iPad to the dash next.
Bare bumper bolts are a bigger aesthetic offense. They’re fine until the 1973 MY, when they began screaming “Cheap!”
The poor Monte Carlo suffered the most from exposed bumper bolts when they weren’t ordered with the optional rub strips. I think all the other GM specialty Coupes had some form of rub strip as standard equipment. I had a 77 Regal and part of my rear strip got broken off and I thought the rear bumper looked appaling with the exposed bumper bolts and empty slots where the strip would snap in. I couldn’t replace that strip fast enough!
It’s funny, just yesterday, I saw this pic of a 78 or 79 Monte Carlo. I think the Monte was the only downsized GM Coupe for 1978 that looked good with the large single rectangular lamps. The Cutlass and Regal didn’t wear them nearly as well and the GP had quads from the start. The slight forward “ships prow” slant of the Monte front end gave the car an almost sharklike nose that was a faithful reinterpretation of the 1973 design that, in my opinion worked quite well. Sady the 73 was saddled with exposed bumper bolts on lesser models and almost comically wide wraparound ends that far exceeded the width of the body, while in 1978 Chevy used cheap plast-chrome strips front and rear to brighten up the body color bumper covers, which was fine until those strips got loose, started flapping and inevitably came off, as is the case with this car.
Does anyone else think single round headlights just look wrong on such a big car as the Monte?
I think that the single round headlights are perfect on such a heavily sculpted car. This simple face worked because it didn’t compete with the heavily sculpted sides. The stacked square quads that came later were awful.
Agree on the “stackers”.
I think they looked worse on the 1971 Grand Prix, after switching from quad lamps in 1970.
Count me as a fan of the of the single round headlights on the Monte and the Grand Prix…in my book they are somehow not slaves to popularity, but true to their designer’s intent. The ’70 Monte is one of my all time favorite GM designs when coupled with no vinyl roof and those large lux hubcaps. On this “73, would love to see what the original design of the front before they were forced to slap on the big battering ram at the last moment.
I think the single rounds work on the Monte fine, it’s supposed to have a neoclassical appearance and that’s the lighting configuration of cars from the era it’s emulating. The rest of the “regular” collonades I agree however, all of them were improved when they were restyled for rectangular quads.
I walked by all of these over the span of a few days. I have seen that older Monte Carlo a number of times, I like it, for reasons mysterious to myself. I also like the new Monte Carlo with those crazy LED lights. The newer Monte Carlo was always supposed to be “space age” in some fashion, so those lights just add to it – and I assume they are brighter and therefore safer as well. I don’t know about the Cadillac, reallly. The LED lights don’t quite fit, but I find that generation of Cadillac rather poorly proportioned and ugly anyhow, so it’s not something I can really appreciate either way.
Thanks for posting these pictures!
The Monte Carlo in the lead picture is just aching for some headlight eyeball decals to match those menacing grill emblems. I always get a kick out of readers comments and how fired up they get about LED retrofit headlamps.
The full nose of the later model Monte Carlo appears very plasticky. Of all the technical improvements made to the resilience, appearance, and detailed use of plastic, it does not look like metal. Even, when painted. Most of the time, the human eye and brain, can readily see surfaces as plastic. And we’ve come to expect its heavy use as well, unfortunately.
I realize not everyone shares my feelings, but that 70’s Monte Carlo was absolutely garish, gauche to me. Just chew my arm off to get out coyote ugly to my eyes. Seventeen and a half feet long, fit for only two people, but slow and thirsty.
The Cad, while again not to my tastes, wouldn’t look bad for what it is if the headlights were together and the turn signals were inboard. Details.
The later MC while not overtly offensive like the earlier one, was kind of an, “are they really going to sell those things, kind of thing.”
I love the split design of the headlamps on the Cadillac from 1971 to 1973. I think it makes the front look wider and gives the “face” a unique look. In 1974 the turn signals were moved outboard and the headlamps were pused together, making the front look more like other cars of the period. However, those silly modern led headlamp bulbs look silly on this car. They remind me of the plastic “headlamps” on the toy cars or model cars I used to build as a child. The “headlamps” would have a pin on the backside that would snap into a hole in the body of the toy car, and you could invaribly see that ‘pin” from the front of the lamp. It always looked odd to me.
The poor Monte Carlo suffered the most from exposed bumper bolts when they weren’t ordered with the optional rub strips. I think all the other GM specialty Coupes had some form of rub strip as standard equipment. I had a 77 Regal and part of my rear strip got broken off and I thought the rear bumper looked appaling with the exposed bumper bolts and empty slots where the strip would snap in. I couldn’t replace that strip fast enough!
Loose the douche bag led headlights, they look stupid and will look even stupider after a couple of years when the cheap lenses turn yellow and are all crazed from the sun