The official paint color of this 1977 Cadillac Coupe DeVille was “Seamist Green”. This shade reminds me of a candy my grandparents used to keep around their house in one of several fancy, milk glass jars: the butter mint. You know the candy I’m talking about: the solid, slightly chalky but delicious candy flavored with peppermint, made mostly of butter (hence the name) and sugar. It starts melting on your tongue almost immediately after putting one in your mouth. They come in many different pastel colors, but unlike other candies offered in varying hues, the shade of the butter mint does not correspond with any flavor other than peppermint.
Green butter mints picture is courtesy of Sugarman Candy.
Seamist Green is such a pleasant, eye-popping color on what I consider to be the last really attractive generation of Coupe DeVille, especially with its contrasting white landau roof and what also looked like a white leather interior. This old Cadillac didn’t seem as lost in a sea of taxis and crossovers so much as simply aware of its surroundings, moving with stately grace as it crept through morning rush hour traffic.
Whenever I see a car that looks like it must have lived a charmed life for much of its existence in a state like our featured car – solid, complete, a bit rough around the edges, but still obviously cared for, I’ll often wonder to myself about its various owners and path up through the present day. I think of ordering a car new with a white leather interior as being a very deliberate choice, and my guess was that this Coupe DeVille’s first owner was a clean, neat person who must have been undaunted by the prospect of keeping its upholstery clean.
I don’t think of this “butter mint” Cadi as melting in the rain, despite the rust on the rear quarter panel (which is undoubtedly present under that vinyl roof). This Cadillac’s presence is much too solid to connote that kind of frailty. After all, there is a 425-cubic inch V8 under the hood that had at least 180 horsepower when new. Model year 1979 may have been the all-time high water mark for Cadillac sales, with around 383,000 sold, but for the Coupe DeVille, peak production came in ’77, with the newly-downsized CDV moving almost 139,000 units that year with prices starting at around $9,800 (roughly $43,000 / adjusted for 2020). The sedan DeVille moved an additional 95,000 units that same year.
Just like the occasional buttermint will bring back memories of my grandparents and things from their generation, the sight of this Cadillac at the end of a rainy workday reminded me of a time when luxury coupes from GM’s premium brand were still status symbols – even when painted the color of a confection or Easter egg.
Downtown, The Loop, Chicago, Illinois.
Thursday, April 28, 2011.
Can’t say I love the color but will grant that it is distinctive. The “newly downsized” CDV looks right-sized to me, big enough to stand out and make its point, not so huge as to be completely clownish. The car, like the buttermint, also appears to be melting from under the landau top as you noted…
Haha, oh yes do I remember butter mints. They were always in a little dish when my mother wanted to get fancy at something like a confirmation reception. I always wanted to like them more than I actually did.
This shade also reminds me of green Necco wafers (my least favorite flavor of the now-defunct oldest candy in the US). Sadly, I have a less pleasant connotation – the tuxedos of this color that my cousins and I wore at my cousin Butch’s wedding – in 1977, if memory serves. With the white shoes, too. The wedding party could have used a Cadillac like this. I think this color on a late 70s Cadillac has the same kitsch factor as the flamingo-pink paint has on a 61 Studebaker.
I remember that white interiors were really, really cool in the 70s. My mother’s 74 Luxury LeMans had white vinyl seats in an otherwise burgundy interior and my stepmom’s 74 Cutlass supreme had a full white vinyl interior (with a blue dash and carpet) to match the white paint and blue landau roof. Formula 409 was my friend as I tried to keep them both white.
I just looked it up – this was a Cadillac-only color in 1977 and 78. I had remembered another similar light green from other GM Divisions, but that was a different paint code and in 1979.
Oh well, March is coming and we can all have a Shamrock Shake at McD’s. 🙂
JP, I think I know what other shade of pastel green you’re talking about. I photographed a ’79 Pontiac Bonneville probably close to 8 years ago in that color. It is really similar.
As far as Necco wafers go, I’ll just say that while I’m “old school” to an extent, those were an acquired taste for me.
I wouldn’t turn down a Shamrock Shake, though!
It looks as though Necco wafers are scheduled for resurrection.
Ooooooh! I hope they bring back the rolls of all-chocolate ones!
Gah, those things are disgusting. If I got them at Halloween, I gave the parent the stink eye.
Necco wafers must ever die. Otherwise, millions of Catholic children will be without something to serve as a Communion host when they hold “play Mass.”
This is pretty awesome. Necco wafers and Welch’s grape juice.
When I was kid we had to make do with Necco wafers and grape Kool-Aid.
“The body of Christ?”
The rear bumper flexible- fillers look as if they’re disappearing. Few automotive things look more odd than an old Caddy without fillers. Fortunately repops are available on line for the hordes of Deville devotees everywhere.
I like the car, it looks positively neo Gothic
While not a fan of Cadillacs, the 1977-79 generation of CDVs and SDVs ranks among my favorites, with their sensible size and relatively tasteful trim and ornamentation. As I recall, they could be had in a full range of Lucky Charms marshmallow colors, including mint green, butter yellow, and strawberry pink (or at least Mary Kay pink), making for an entire candy bowl of pastels.
I am amazed that the CDV outsold the SDV in 1977. If I recall, it seems the 4-door models of the other GM C-bodies from Buick and Oldsmobile vastly outsold their 2-door counterparts.
“Lucky Charms colors” is the perfect description. I thought that pastel yellow color was positively gorgeous and looked great on these cars.
Hmmm!
It is a minty butter mint slowly being drenched in chocolate rust!
I looks like it fell between the sofa cushions decades ago.
Great car, not so great color. These have always been the definitive Cadillac for me. Right sized, right engine, packing tons of presence and not overly vulgar. Owning a Cadillac has always been on my bucket list and one of this generation would work great. Like Joe, I admire the tenacity it has taken to keep that white interior looking good.
Joe’s grandparents keeping butter mints in a dish reminds me of my grandparents keeping horehound candy in a dish. One of my cousins, at age 4, knowing butter mints were made from butter, asked if horehound candy was made from, well, you guessed it. He didn’t realize the other started with a “w”.
Nice car from IMO the last great generation of Cadillac, I’m not the biggest fan of the late 1970’s automobiles but the B/C cars GM built of that era are among my favorite vehicles built in the 1970’s (I normally prefer early 1970’s cars).
Joseph
Maybe if we squint a bit and use our imagination, she’d look a bit more like this one, found on the internet!
Dean, your picture perfectly illustrates just how right these cars could look in this unusual color. Thanks for posting this.
I was going to ask if there was a single Cadillac painted this color that did *not* come with white leather interior, but it would appear that you found one!
Maybe a second one?
Once again you were able to capture the ‘eL’ in the background- way cool!
That minty green, light butter yellow, and baby blue were very popular car color choices in the late seventies- early eighties that now look kitschy. I wonder if those pastel colors represent some way to counteract punk music, rapidly changing morals and a tough economy that was happening at the time?
I recently read that 40% of cars in the world are white. I’m not the type of person that would want a white living room or car interior. I’ve never liked a white convertible or vinyl top.
It’s amazing how well Cadillac was doing at the end of the seventies. It’s also remarkable that more Coupe DeVille were sold than the Sedan DeVille. I like the ‘77-‘79 models, I’m glad that these downsized models were well made as it’s a way to help forget the diesels, V4-6-8, FWD ‘85 and downsized ‘86 Eldorado that followed.
Great find and yes, sure looks like butter mints. My grandmother Mère had those on her coffee table in the family room, while my other grandmother Wowo kept lemon drops in a fancy glass jar in the living room.
I do love these ’77 – ’79 Cadillacs and agree that they were one of the best generations of the Coupe DeVille. I also think that the wide color palette was part of the “luxury” aspect of Cadillac at the time. The broad range of choices, including some rather dramatic/unexpected hues, allowed the owner to really personalize the car and stand out in the crowd, which was seen as a big plus. Also, given that the owner base at the time was likely to trade the Caddy for a new car (often another Cadillac) after just a few years, people were willing to take more risk on colors that would date quickly–the car would often would be gone by the time color tastes changed.
I think most guys here know I am the caretaker for a 1978 Sedan Deville. Lately I’ve had a hankering to get here out of storage.
To emphasise just how bullet-proof old GM cars of the era, i connected the battery, cranked for like ten second and away she went.
The 425 probably makes more than 180 hp, but the real factor is the torque, 330 lb/ft at a whopping 2000 RPM. The rear axle is 2.28:1 which means little in this car. The torque peak exactly coincides with 70 MPH.
It drives so well it can keep up to, and even pass, modern traffic.
The only downside is the horridly crappy interior but I just love the car. I like it more than Hot Rod Lincoln, which is now a 434 stroker. With the .0.020 overbore, it’s a Ford 440. I really should do a CC on it. I did the motor in 2018 and last year, I had very bushing and ball joint in the car replaced,along with new springs,adjustable shocks and rear sway bar. It no longer scares me with how badly it drove.
I didn’t know those things were called butter mints.
On the topic of cars and confection colors, it reminds me of salt water taffy, a popular candy sold to tourists in towns along the New Jersey coast.
The car reminds me of old people who brought their large, old American cars to Atlantic City back in the day, lured by free parking for their cars and rolls of quarters to prime the slot machines.
A scene from the alternate universe film “Blues Brothers 1990”.
Nice find and write-up Joseph. I remember when I worked at the Chev-Olds-Cadillac dealer, we had a ’78 or ’79 Coupe DeVille traded in. It looked just like the one you posted except it was a pastel, er butter candy, yellow. It had some a dark vinyl landau top. It was rough around the edges and I considered buying it, as I could have got it for a song as an employee. Ultimately I passed on it. As nice as these Cadillacs are, they were just too luxurious and broughamy for my taste. A technician at the dealer who loved to buy old Cadillacs bought it and fixed it up, giving it a new lease on life.
It looked like this one, but with a different vinyl top.
Back when I was a Boy Scout one of the older boys in my troop drove a big old yellow late ’70s Coupe DeVille pretty much identical to that one. We nicknamed it the Banana Boat, because it was such a boat of a car, and it was yellow.
At the time I never thought to ask how a teenager ended up driving such a stereotypical old person’s car. I always assumed it was a hand-me-down from an older relative. I shouldn’t talk; I ended up in pretty much the same boat when I turned 16 — I got stuck with a Buick.
This one did follow me home, and is still an ongoing project. Burgundy D’Elegance interior though…very odd colour combination!
Nice Caddy Dean! How many cars do you have? You have to do a COAL series.
Vince, I agree with you. Dean, I see a very nice diamond-in-polishing!
I might add the coupes are starting to appreciate, the four doors not so much.
I like the green but mine was Naples yellow. Here I am with my three year old dream car.
Also a very nice example, Jose! (Also, is / was that a ’56 Chevrolet wagon in the garage?)
I’m sorry to be “that guy”, but, to me, the ’77-’79 CDV looks like a ’74-’76 CDV that was left in the dryer too long and shrank. Kind of like the ’80-’83 Mark VI looks like a ’77-’79 Mark V which suffered the same fate.
Anyway, although I think the ’74-’76 CDV was the most stylish, I think the best-looking CDV was the ’80-’84 version.
Here’s a 1983 brochure pic…
Michael, I do remember liking the 1980 restyle at the time it came out, when I was a kid. I think I’d have more appreciation for this generation if it didn’t hang around for quite as long as it did.
My favorite uncle, my father’s younger brother, spent his entire working life with the same corporation, working his way up the ladder. He was an accountant and at the end was in charge of investing corporate funds, on both a short term and a long term basis. At the same time he was working his way up the GM hierarchy; his first new car was a 1962 Chevrolet. This was followed by a couple of Oldsmobiles, a Buick or two, and then on to the Cadillac. Uncle Lloyd had talked about wanting a Cadillac for as long as I could remember, it was his automotive holy grail. Then, when he finally reached the point in his career when it was acceptable to drive a Cadillac, GM went and downsized them. He bought one of the new “smaller” Sedan de Villes in 1977 and was disappointed from the beginning. I don’t think it was the fact that the Cadillac was smaller than before that bothered him as much as he thought that the Cadillac was not as special as they were in the forties and fifties. I got to drive his new SDV on a couple of occasions and I thought it was a fine car, quiet and even reasonably well composed on the road. For whatever reason he didn’t keep the Cadillac all that long, trading it in on a FWD Park Avenue.
That was my neighbor’s 55-56 Ford wagon.
One of the early cars in our Family was a 1950 or 1951 Ford. The Factory color description was Glen Mist Green. In My Memory, the color was more subdued than that of your Coupe DeVille
My Dad had a ’77 Coupe Deville this color; Beautiful. He totaled it and they bought a ’79 Sedan Deville, last year for the 425.