Chevrolet Impala Side Trim Evolution

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I wrote about the redesigned 2014 Chevrolet Impala in this post.  But what about earlier designs launched intermittently starting with the 1958 model year?

General Motors' entry-level brand is Chevrolet, and such brands seems to care less about styling feature continuity across redesigns compared to upscale makes such as Roll-Royce, or Packard in its day.  Chevy's Impala model is a case in point, as can be seen below.

Gallery

1958 Chevrolet Impala, Barrett-Jackson auction photo
First-generation Impalas featured a complicated side-trim composition.  There was a long, horizontal spear shape from which a link was provided to curved chrome trim along the edge of rear fender sculpting.  Aligned (almost) with the forward point of the latter is a vertical decoration mimicking exhaust venting that also sports four horizontal "speed lines."  Abaft of the rear wheel opening is a spear form that blends with rear bumper shaping.  It contains four vertical chrome hash marks.  There are also four chrome hash marks on the front fender immediately aft of the headlights.  Taken together, these represent side-view characteristics of the Impala as it was first hatched.

1959 Chevrolet Impala, Mecum auction photo
Unusually, the 1958 Chevrolet (and Pontiac) bodies were in production for only one model year, being replaced for 1959 by a set of bodies shared across all GM brands.  Here the Impala retains only a variation on the horizontal spear theme.

1961 Chevrolet Impala, Mecum photo
For its next redesign, Impala featured a side spear that widened as it extended towards the rear.

1965 Chevrolet Impala, Volo photo
Then for 1965 the spear theme was discarded.  Nothing remained from the model's launch theme.

1971 Chevrolet Impala, unknown photo source

1977 Chevrolet Impala, factory image
The next two redesigns contained nothing suggesting Impala aside from the word placed below the C-pillar in the car shown here.

1994 Chevrolet Impala, via Automobile Magazine
By 1994, all Impalas were four-door sedans.  That body was wide and heavy-looking -- not graceful like the creature the model was named for.

2000 Chevrolet Impala, factory image

2006 Chevrolet Impala, sales photo
The following two designs can be characterized as nondescript.  The only Impala features visible are medallions on the C-pillars.

2014 Chevrolet Impala, factory photo
Then for 2014 a hint of original Impala styling returned in the form of rear-fender sculpting echoing that shown below in a repeat of the initial Impala image.

1958 Chevrolet Impala

1973 Chevrolet Monte Carlo
As an aside, the 1958 Impala rear fender chrome trim shape was revived for this 1973 Monte Carlo in the form of raised sculpting.

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