For two wonderful years the Opel Kadett and Opel Astra F shared space at Opel dealers across this wonderful continent (1991 to 1993).
And Bertone in Turin supplied the car too. That Bertone supplied the mechanism and built the bodies is news to me. It competed with the Ford Escort cabriolet, made by Karmann, and the Golf cabriolet, made by Karmann, which was the Mk 1 Golf, as per 1974 minus a roof. In addition to traditional Opel qualities, the Kadett also had a certain degree of Italian style lacking from its peers…
…..No. That’s a bit too Myles Gorfe, isn’t it? What I really meant to write was that the cabrio is inoffensive but it has no Italian style at all. If it’s not bad it’s also not especially great. Bertone didn’t know how to deal with the painted frame of the door and it stops rather abruptly, just short of the radius of the windscreen frame.
The aerodynamic wheel arches are carried over from the hatchback and I think that’s an GSi bumper, without the foglamps. It took Pininfarina and Peugeot until 1993 to get the small cabriolet concept exactly right: the 306 is a looker, top up or top down. The Opel here has too much of an expedient revision though I dare they that doesn’t stop them being fun. If you could find one with black paint the graphic problems go away. For the Astra F the designers blended the roof with the body much more smoothly. It’s very handsome (of course).
I should mention that I am still on the look-out for the convertible version of the Astra F, to complete my celebration of the Astra’s 25th anniversary.
Driven To Write 
I’ve never actually noticed that detail, but now I’ve seen it I will never be able of looking at that car with the same eyes again. And that’s why I love this site, because it handles details like that with the attention they so rightly deserve. And I agree, this conversion screams of rush job to me. Though, to Bertones credit, they made a better job with the later Astra coupe and convertible, which seems like a more original job to me.
Thank you!
Isn’t the Astra cabrio quite smart? The base of the fabric roof is a single curved line. Too bad Opel did it. Had Peugeot or VW managed it we’d have national holidays to celebrate. As it is, it’s another ignored Ruesselsheim gem.
I owned a Kadett Bertone Cabrio for about ten years. Why i bought it? The Golf and the Escort convertibles were girl´s cars – the Kadett wasn´t. While Escort amd Golf (I) were available in bicolor or strange colours and often ordered with a white roof, the Kadett was much more serious – in my opinion. Mine had a very frugal 1.6 engine and very nice seats.
The weak spot of this car was rust – the Cabrio was a combination of the lowest GM quality standards combined with typical italian anti-rust-prophylaxe of the eighties.. So after 2 teutonic winters my white Kadett Cabrio was a bicolor car too….
The red one above did never never saw snow in his life, i am sure. Seems to be in a very good condition.
That’s a sorry tale.
The red one here might very well be an import. However, the winters are so horrible here that many people have garages. That means a car can avoid 98% of the exposure to weather that one parked in the open experiences. This car could have been garaged.
You might be right about the Opel’s image versus the other two. Without meaning to. e rude, was it because it looked a bit less “pretty” and “cute” than the Golf and Escort?
The Golf was a seventies car – and here in Germany a Golf Cabrio (white with a white roof and white seats) was the car of Sascha Hehn in the Soap Opera “Schwarzwaldklink”, and this young not very masculine surgeon with perfect hair was the dream of all old ladies.
The Escort was the typical car of young female secretaries and doctor´s assistants, they prefer it in bicolor.
The Astra F Cabrio is a pretty car, but i woult prefer the Peugeot 306 Cabrio. A wonderful beauty from Pininfarina.