London Times on the MINI’s 50th Birthday

Let the celebration begin. The London Times a closer look at what made the Mini special. Here’s an excerpt:
>The car was a design classic almost from birth and, of course, in 1969 became a film star, wriggling in a cheeky convoy through the streets of Turin in The Italian Job – the producers were offered as many free Fiat 500s as they could write off but preferred to pay hard cash for British steel. Hey, that’s showbiz.
>Accordingly, the real mystery of the Mini is not how many elephants you can get into one (two in the front and two in the back, according to every joke book published since 1959); it’s how a car so freighted with mythology could still move forwards under its own momentum. The buzz and froth created by the Mini would not have impressed Sir Alec Issigonis, its designer, whose original mission was not to build a snazzy runabout for Mary Quant but to produce a practical, affordable city car for a Britain still finding petrol hard to come by after Suez. In any case, Issigonis frowned on frippery. Aged 53 when the Mini went into production, he couldn’t see why a car needed a radio, and refrained from smoking while at the wheel, believing that driving should occupy a person entirely.
+ The Mini at 50: why we’ll never tire of these wheels / London Times
5 Comments
I hope BMW will re-read this before starting work on the gen.3 car and not make it bigger yet again. Better yet, rehire Frank Stevenson, designer of the R53, to do the next one.
A freeking men! The extra 2.5 inches on the R56 feel/look like 2.5 feet. It’s not even that small of a car anymore. Purists freeked in ’99 when gen 1 came out. They must have barfed when gen 2 hit. Hey Mini, shrink this thing up a bit for gen 3!!!
MINI still wind up having an edge to them, even today. It’s just some weird quirky vibe….probably a combination of styling and a really fun car to drive. That BMW got any of this right is almost miraculous…it doesn’t happen that often. Along with this, it’s nice to see MINIs now getting 40+ mpg…that’s as much a Mini thing as the rest!!!
Yeah – bring back Frank.
I hope Paul and Ringo will be at the 50th birthday party bash.
For those of us who were around then, either you were of the Beatles or Mini generation.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. A smaller MINI is the only new MINI I’ll buy. Bring back Frank, bring back small, bring back Mini. Until then, I’ll stick with my R50 and classics.
KLF23.