A chic fashion show at the Brussels World’s Fair is the setting for this detailed look at the 1959 Fords.
The scene is the U.S. Pavilion at Expo 58, the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair, where there’s a fashion show in progress that prominently features the 1959 Fords. It seems the Ford Motor Company has just received a gold medal from the Comité Français des L’élegance of Paris, a highly prestigious fashion award, we are given to understand. (Personally, we wouldn’t know.) It’s not clear if the Comité or the automaker chose these exact words, but here the new ’59 models are modestly described as “the world’s most beautifully proportioned cars.”
We found it interesting that Ford chose not to showcase its top-of-the-line models for this display but reached slightly downrange. Instead of a Galaxie, there’s a Fairlane 500; representing the station wagons is a Country Sedan rather than a Country Squire; and the convertible is a cloth-top Sunliner, not a Skyliner retractable. Perhaps the idea was to demonstrate that all the ’59 Fords represented the pinnacle of fashion, not just the priciest cars in the lineup. (We did include a Galaxie in the lead photo above.) It’s said that Ford styling chief George Walker called the ’59s his favorites of all the cars designed under his direction.
Ford did indeed have a decent year in 1959 with a total production of 1,462,000 cars, trailing its archrival Chevrolet by a mere 19,000 units. A new trim level that year, the Galaxie was actually the best seller of the lineup, accounting for more than 269,000 of the total. Full-sized Ford buyers were shopping for features over price: 78 percent chose V8s over the inline six, while 71 percent opted for the automatic transmission. Video below.
At introduction, the Fairlane 500 was the top model, the Galaxie was introduced during the 1959 model year. The fair ran from 4/17/1958 to 10/19/1958, so anything on display before October 19 would be a very early 1959 model.
The 1959 model year was the last before the longer-lower-wider design cues took hold. I wonder if there is any connection between this and the radical change in women’s fashion that occured during the 1960s — going from formal dresses with white gloves to the miniskirt.
Always liked the looks of the late 50s Fords. My friends brother (who worked for a place that made headstones) had a convertible and let him have it for a sunny Saturday afternoon in the mid 60s. So here are four teens cruising around the city, top down but with big tombstone logos on the doors. The car also had no reverse gear so a fun ride but a little embarrassing at the same time.