(first posted 1/13/2014) When I ran across this shot of a genuine curbside Seville Milan posted at the Cohort by whatnext2010, it reminded of some shots of other Seville conversions from the web I had in my files. The gen1 Seville is a bit of a controversial subject around these parts, and although its styling is not exactly my cup of tea, I have always said that it is a fairly handsome car. In its unaltered state, that is. Unfortunately, it inspired a host of bizarre and tasteless conversions.
Like this Seville Grandeur Opera Coupe (the name alone says it all). But no opera window?
I’m still trying to decide which angle flatters this car best. The view of the undercariage?
If you’re looking something for a bit more parking lot friendly, let me show you the brilliant Seville Milan Roadster. Who needs a Mercedes SL when there’s a genuine home-grown alternative available? I’m sure Bill Mitchell approved. On second thought, maybe he really would have, despite its stubbiness. The Allante, by Cadillac. No need to fly the bodies in from Italy.
If opera is not your thing, you might want to stick to the more traditional Grandeur Formal Sedan. It doesn’t get much grandeur than that, eh?
There’s also this shorty coupe, the Seville Tomaso Coupe. BTW, hacking off the rear passenger compartment had the effect of doubling the price of the Tomaso over a plebeian Seville. But at what price prestige?
There was actually one tasteful custom Seville, the San Remo. It didn’t try so hard to improve on the Seville, but just turned it into a convertible, and one that suits the Seville’s lines very well. Too bad the factory didn’t try this.
That’s more like it…it boggles the mind to think that folks would even consider one of those chopped or stretched Sevilles, when this was available. What’s the old line about taste?
The San Remo works because they lengthened the doors.
Ding ding ding! We have a winner. Obviously, sadly, we have a whole bunch of losers too — the ones who try to make sedans into coupes on the cheap, or 4-door wagons into sedan deliveries, without understanding that if you use unmodified short sedan doors, the result will look terminally stupid.
Other than the last one, thanks for a great lunchtime laugh/giggle.
The San Remo looks like a LeBaron convertible prototype.
The tail lamps and trunk lid do look like they came out of a K Car parts bin. They detract from an otherwise commendable effort.
The San Remo Seville was being built years before the Chrysler K cars were ever offered for sale. The K’s rear looks like the San Remo, not the other way around.
The San Remo was beautifully executed and works to the point of looking 100% OEM Cadillac. I believe these were quite expensive cars in 1979. Maybe $40K+ ?
These guys really went all out to make these Sevilles unique and very special. Custom made full length Elegante’ style brushed strips, very nice.
I always liked the additional touch and work that they did to eliminate the wrap-around tail-lamps and use horizontal Eldorado lamps in the rear. I think the clean rear quarter panel with the lower trim marker lamp is especially good looking.
So many convertibles look good ONLY with the top up, or… ONLY with the top down. The San Remo is a gorgeous car either way.
I had wanted one for a long time (and still do), but only ever ran across, hacked/beat up, bad body work, or really nice but outrageously priced.
The Grand Opera coup’e has to be the ugliest thing ever made it makes the rustbucket Seville nearby look good however, The San Remo however looks ok they at least tried to get the proportions right,
When I came to Gallup, NM the local golf pro had one of 2 door convertible conversions which he drove daily for his job at the municipal course. White, tan interior, and tan top, I never got close enough to see who the manufacturer was. The customized plate said “PAR 4”.
There was a mayoral election, change in city leadership, and one day he and the car were gone.
That San Remo is beautiful. It is hard to imagine a better convertible (or 2 door) conversion of a Gen1 Seville than this.
As for the rest, ….
No question, the San Remo custom Seville is a very elegant interpretation of what a proper first generation Seville convertible could look like. Using tasteful execution. But it does appear to owe a tip of the hat to the concurrent Rolls-Royce Corniche convertible, in terms of it’s proportions and inspiration. They look so much alike, with regards to their presence. Not knowing it’s history, I’d have to think the RR perhaps influenced (and encouraged) the San Remo designers.
I was going to say the same thing about it looking very similar to the Corniche. Probably a worthy competitor too considering price and exclusivity.
+1, But rarely ever saw a San Remo. On the other hand, the miserable shortened roadsters were the bane of collector car auctions for years. That is until the vibrations and poor craftsmanship caught up with them.
Several of these monstrosities are available for purchase right now on Hemmings Motor News, probably because they’re darned near impossible to sell.
http://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/carsforsale/cadillac/seville
At those prices I’m not surprised current owners must have paid big coin for those Frankenstein’s, Best to wait for scrap to go up in value.
One of the ads refers to a “jaw-dropping custom creation”, and, well…they certainly make your jaw drop, I’ll give ’em that.
Sorry about the bad quality of the shot, which was taken in the mid-ninties. If you look at the silver Seville parked up against the wall (behind the ’68 Fleetwood), it is a “Canso”, which was built by A.H.A of Toronto circa 1979. I wished that I could have saved it, as it was really classy, but the rust had set in too deep for my pocketbook. A very rare bird.
Where was this location? So many Cadillacs……
Classy Caddy in Oakville, Ontario (Toronto area). Three of the cars are mine, the ’81 CDV nearest the camera, (I had just bought it and taken a picture). the yellow ’75 MC, and the ’68 Fleetwood against the wall to the right of the Seville. The shop was a one-man operation run by an ex tool and die machinist turned Caddy specialist. As with most of these things, when he wanted to do good work, it was great, but if you achieved friend or acquaintance status, your car sat and sat. The picture was taken in 1996, but I’ve also taken tons of pictures of the various cars that came into his shop from 1988 through 2005. Lots of really neat Caddies and other GM’s, but lots of other stuff as well. I have proper pictures of the Canso, but all are on film and need to be digitized. I seem to recall him saying that this was one of about seven made and very rare. Broke my heart to see it being broken up for spare parts. Attached is a shot of my ’68 having her bottom attended to.
Money never bought good taste however the San Remo is spectacular.
All I see is donk’d out Caprice and bunch of ugly kit looking cars.
Apart from the San Remo the rest are too horrible for words.The Grandeurs look like the sort of thing Huggy Bear would love
With the exception of the very appealing San Remos, the rest of these are body-modification at a Fakir Musafar level.
The original Seville was arguably the hottest car of the mid to late 70s, a full five years after the imports took off. These outrageous custom jobs say a lot about its popularity and role in pop culture.
+++
Those fake sidemounts are a level of ugly beyond brougham!
The current equivalent is the half-sized continental kit I’ve seen on a couple of Chrysler 300’s.
Saw some real ones on a Buick on Sunday much nicer.
I wonder what they did with the extra space under the hood? Storage for cocaine and guns perhaps?
Both.
In way, these were like the custom coachbuilt cars of the 20’s and 30’s, but with less successful results, but what were you to do if you were rising up quicky in the drug trade, moving severe tonnage of bolivian bullion every week? Just go and buy a regular Seville like a dentist or your lawyer? Naaaaaaah, you need something that says, “I’ve made it!” I’m at the top of my chosen illegal profession!
The Seville 2 seaters are curious, I’ve often thought that the Seville could have made an interesting SL type convertible, a proto-Allante if you will, but it would have to be properly proportioned, it would need longer doors and a proper wheelbase adjustment to look good, but it could have been done.
Those Seville “chops” look terrible mostly because they use the small sedan doors, which makes the car look sort of like a midget in tuxedo, strange.
The San Remo and the Canso coupes look good because someone took the time to actually make a well proportioned product, I believe they both use door skins from an X-body coupe to complete the look.
Cadillac considered a factory Seville coupe during the design process, but it nixed the idea fearing that it would eat into Eldorado sales.
That Saturn-raping Dodge van would make quick work of those cute little convertibles.
I think that Grandeur sedan would look good…without the spare tires.
I would’ve liked to see a Seville coupe using an unmodified Nova coupe body-in-white. Maybe a hatchback for easier golf-bag loading.
I actually tried the Nova-Seville Mashup 2-door like nipnt suggested. I had a rusty 2 door Nova hardtop and a flood damaged Seville and reskinned the Nova with the Seville sheetmetal. It was amazing how much bolted up and mated together. The hardest part was to get the sheetmetal to properly transition between the front fender and the door. I had my fun and moved onto another project, but here is a picture of it in-progress when I had it.
Looks like you went deeper than the skin (I’m looking at the larger 5×5 bolt-pattern wheels). Cool.
Thanks – the entire front subframe and nose practically bolted into place and I swapped it in as one piece, engine and transmission included!. The rear axle + leaf springs bolted right up as did the rear bumper.
The one thing I noticed when I cut up the Seville was how heavily built it was. Very Beefy!
Here’s another view
Got any more pictures? I’d love to see them and do a post on your car. If so, send them to me at the Contact form or curbsideclassic(at)gmail.com
nlpnt, here you go. Its not in white though.
I will recreate this master piece do u have more pick of this grey seville
Well, that pretty much puts the exclamation mark on Brougham week!
Smart thinking for the builders of the Seville Tomaso Coupe not to add that incriminating “de” in the model designation. I’d imagine the lawsuits would have been fast, furious and decisive!
Hey! No one told me this was gag-relfux week. I only have one Gaviscon left. Need to switch over to Candy Crush so I don’t blow. Oh…. wait…not a good plan…
The San Remo works…the rest are lost in the murk.
So are the Milan and Tomaso riding on a shortened wheelbase?
I assume it stayed the same for the Grandeur and others.
I actually wonder how the Milan and Tomaso do in the handling department. Also if performance improved since they are missing half the car.
I’d think those Grandeur ones would handle better- mid engined just like a Ferrari.
Kinda…
The Seville (Delusions of) Grandeur Opera Coupe. For people who find Excaliburs and Clénets too austere and puritanical.
I would say that the real 1975-79 Cadillac Seville 2 Door Conversion Coupe probably done by San Remo looked something like the photo posted below in which I also put a 1977 Chevrolet Nova Concours 2 Door Coupe next to it for side by side comparisons. If I find other similar/identical size Cadillacs (within the Nova and Seville size range), I will post them here as well in the future.
Here are some more Cadillac Mid-Sized 2 Door Coupes of similar sizes and designs. 1977 Cadillac Seville 2 Door Conversion Coupe (Top Row Left), 1980 Cadillac Seville 2 Door Conversion Bustle Back Coupe (Top Row Right), 1979 Cadillac Eldorado 2 Door Coupe (Second Row Left), 2002 Cadillac Eldorado 2 Door Coupe (Second Row Right), 1987 Cadillac Coupe De Ville 2 Door Coupe (Third Row Left), 1987 Cadillac Fleetwood 2 Door Coupe (Third Row Right), 1989 Cadillac Coupe De Ville 2 Door Coupe (Bottom Row Left) & 1991 Cadillac Fleetwood 2 Door Coupe (Bottom Row Right). The 1977 & 80 Cadillac Seville 2 Door Conversion Coupes were however done by aftermarket outfitters outside of General Motors Corporation though, but the conversions out of many shown on Google-Wikipedia Images illustrated the ones selected here were if Cadillac actually brought these Sevilles into production.
Check the uncanny similarities between the 1987 Cadillac Coupe De Ville 2 Door Coupe (left) vs. the 1977 Cadillac Seville 2 Door Conversion Coupe (right).
Does anyone know if anyone is selling a Seville San Remo?
I wonder who was paying such big bucks for tarting up their Cadillac in the 70s?
Or who looked at the Milan and said “Yes, this is proportional.”?
Living in salt country, when I see such custom creations I have to wonder how much of the factory rustproofing was compromised cutting these cars up and welding them back together. The San Remo is the Belle of the Ball. The rest, not even close. Dolly Parton said it best, “It costs a lot to look this cheap!”
I like the San Remo, and it’s something that would have been great as a factory offering. The rest? NO. That’s all. Just NO.
Must be Pimpmobile Week at CC!
We should really do one, it might be fun
The San Remo works, but the shortened ones look like clown cars. Uppercrust clowns, of course!
I’ve never seen that San Remo. Beautiful. But I bet those hardtop windows don’t work very well, not in an aftermarket conversion.
Has anyone seen or heard of a 1977 sevelle fisher addition? Look factory?