Do you like how I included that parenthetical in the headline there, lest anyone actually think that my skull had been shattered into innumerable little shards and flung about, as my brain explodes from the sheer wonder of these special edition Japanese Volkswagens? I did that for you, since it’s too early in the morning for you to be confronted with the notion of a head exploding like a cantaloupe filled with M-80s. That’s a miserable fate for either head or melon.
But that is not what we are dealing with here! We’re dealing with delight, delight at the learning of something once unknown, something fascinating and wonderful. Something about a series of Volkswagen special edition, limited run cars from 1977, part of the Yanase dealership in Japan.
These came to my attention via this Instagram post:
View this post on Instagram
The post is, of course, fascinating, and shows a flyer from Yanase, the Japanese importer of Volkswagens since 1952, and these seem to be their 25th anniversary editions, coming out in 1977, which checks out with the math. Some sources say Yanase started importing Beetles in 1953, but this ad says ’52, so I’ll trust it.
In honor of this anniversary, Yanase offered a line of special edition (only about 30 of each seem to have been made?) Beetles designed in conjunction with various famous people – artists, photographers, architects, fashion designers, and so on. The results are pretty striking:
Look at that brick one! It seems to have been done by architect Kiyoshi Seike, and the style of brickwork is known as Flemish Bond, which does seem to be A Thing. Seike seemed to be delighted by the impossibility of the material for a car.
The black-and-red one is from fashion designer Hiroyuki Yamamoto and is based on a zipper design, revealing black underneath red, like unzipping a jacket to reveal a shirt.
There’s also photographer Yoshihiro Tachiki, cartoonist Isao Kojima, and Toko Adachi, a flower arranger who created the deliberately asymmetrical cherry blossom (I think?) design:
Also interesting to note are the vertical indicator repeaters on the front quarter panels, which seems to be a Japanese market exclusive. The overall spec of these is a bit like a mix of European and American spec, with the bumper-mounted indicators of late Beetle production, rubber impact strips in bumpers like on post ’74 US cars, but without the shock-mounted 5mph US bumpers. There is a padded dash as on US cars, but right-hand drive, of course, since it’s a Japanese car.
The Insta post shows that at least one of the cherry blossom ones survives, and I wouldn’t be surprised to find that some more are around as well; these are too special to just be discarded, wouldn’t you think?
What happened to carmakers collaborating with artists and designers and flower arrangers to make special editions of entry-level cars? There should be more of whatever one calls this in the world.
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What’s going on with the top left one?
Is it a take on a Model T or something. Implying a vinyl roof with wooden wagon wheels
https://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/118802/155425.jpg
Were these painted or decal sets?
The Yanase dealership network was 110 years old last May! Wow.
The world needs more parenthetical remarks (because footnotes are neat.)
Parenthetical remarks (usually explanatory to the main sentence) are inferior to gedankenstriche – god I hope I spelled that right – which literally mean thought strokes.
I do like the 8-spokes on the black-and-white one with the red interior. Better looking than EMPI GT-8s or whatever they’re called. Never actually seen that design before.
Yeah, that one is my favorite of the bunch. Those wheels really set it off.
You picked the best one.
Makes me think of the BMW art cars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Art_Car
We need more of this in the automotive world.
The face with the blue hair blowing in the wind reminds me of the original Princess Cruises “Seawitch” logo which came into prominence around the same time.
The Cherry Blossom looks a little like blood spatter, or at least that was my first thought.
Looks to me like a Yayoi Kusama installation.
She probably did something on/in a car at some point. Probably involving nudity. I’ll check the 10 pound coffee table book of her work when I get home.
Measles.
Lady Snowblood edition
IG translation says they’re fruit? “And if you look closely, this southern heavenly fruit is painted instead of a sticker!”
Google says “nandina berries” instead of “southern heavenly fruit”.
VW Japan was doing Itasha before Itasha was a twinkle in it’s otaku’s eye.
You guys all see Flemish Bond boy as a British Spy. I see him as a Scottish Headmaster.
“How can you have any pudding if you won’t eat your Meat!”
The Laddie reckons himself a poet!
Just putting it out there in case any auto execs are reading that we need more silly “special editions” with cute paint jobs. Not everything needs to look like a tank or an angry gray bug.
90% of special editions in Australia now are ‘blacked out’ editions with tint and wheels blacked out and look generally terrible.
Ford did a nice job of this with the “retro” inspired Broncos and Bronco Sports. Light, bright sunny colors and I LOVE a white roof on anything square. Really want to do that to my Disco I someday.
I do appreciate how one of these Beetles has a proto-“The Fast and The Furious” 2001 decal.
The parenthetical was refreshing, actually, compared to all the people out there who use “literally” incorrectly.
I’m surprised the Yanase cars were RHD. Yanase sells lots of LHD cars new in Japan and they’re somewhat considered to be a status symbol, but maybe that wasn’t the case back then.
Are you sure you didn’t mean Phlegmish Bond, James Bond’s wheezy cousin?
“The name’s Bond–” *hacking, liquid-y cough*–“Phlegmish Bond. May I offer you a Sudafed from my personal collection?”
I enjoyed Ian Phlegming’s novel about him, “On Her Majesty’s Sucrets Service.”
And Goldfinger, about a supervillain’s booger picking habits.
Thanks, I didn’t know about the architect Kiyoshi Seike. His houses on the link are really sparse and interesting. His VW looks pretty tacky though!
FYI VW Type2 T3’s are often called Bricks for obvious reasons.
The Japanese seem to do whimsy better than we do in the west.
And the Japanese mass market appreciation of it is really impressive – a ton of western brands offer all kinds of special, cool stuff for that market because it’ll actually sell. Meanwhile, we get like a single version of whatever it is b/c that’s the only way most people will even consider it.
Our choices are, would you like it in grey, black, or white? Haha.
Ennui, depression, boredom or red.
If these metaphorical M-80s were crammed into a cantaloupe how would they be ignited? Would their fuses be -fused- into one so that a person would only have to light a single fuse? Or do you light the last one in and hope it sparks a chain reaction of little explosions? The latter would seem to impart less damage on the cantaloupe but would be a different kind of terror.
The mind reels.
Cut it apart. M-80’s in the middle with a long fuse made out of other M-80s or whatever fireworks are at hand. Duct tape it back up. Flame on.
Fireworks legal childhood in the 70s was fun.
You see, each one represents a song from Yellow Submarine:
The brick one is Eleanor Rigby,
the woman is Lucy of wholm is in the sky with diamonds,
The lines is Nowhere Man (all the rainbows and stuff), Cherry Blossoms is When I’m 64 because it looks like a grandma’s wallpaper,
and uhhh then I’m out of ideas.
Whichever one sold the least gets to be Pete Best?
Anyone else seeing a pistol on the cream colored one on the left? Like, a broom handled Mauser?
Well I do now.
I’m not seeing a red 9 anywhere, so it seems this is one of the older 7.63mm C96s. It’s a missed opportunity too; the red 9 on the handle could have been a racing number a la Herbie.
The top-left white and black one is pretty neat.
I 100% clicked this to find out about the Beetle Speedster.
Imagine that design on an actual Volkswagen Thing.
It would fit.