The folks at American Motors were mighty proud of the freshly restyled Rambler American for 1961: They called it their “American Beauty.”

“Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder,” wrote the Irish novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford in 1878, although the idea is as old as Plato. We could only add, “Ain’t that the truth.” While we admire the 1961 Rambler American, we’ve never considered it one of the world’s most beautiful cars. Howevear, American Motors took a different view in this campaign. Here, it called the newly restyled American an “American Beauty,” including blooming roses and a pretty television model in the narrative to put the point across.

When AMC chief George Romney brought back the discontinued 1950-55 Rambler compact in 1958 with just a mild restyle, it was a smart move at the right time. The small car market was heating up, and the carmaker was soon zooming up the U.S. sales charts. By 1961, the American was long overdue for new exterior sheet metal, but the antiquated 1950 unit-construction platform forced a compromise, resulting in the ’61’s tall, boxy packaging. (See our feature on the ’61’-63 American here.) The reskin was clever and resourceful, but beautiful? If you say so.

On the other hand. here AMC could point us to a number of very attractive features in the new American: ease of handling and parking, low fuel consumption, 50 percent greater trunk volume, and the lowest price of any U.S. compact. With growing numbers of buyers choosing smaller, more practical vehicles, American Motors shot up to third in U.S. sales in 1961, trailing only Chevrolet and Ford. And for the smallest of the Motor City’s big four, that was a beautiful thing. Video below.