A soft day for a first sighting.
Editor’s note: This piece was written and first published on DTW in August 2018. All images via the author.
While the remainder of Europe desiccates amidst the most protracted heatwave of recent times, here at that question mark of a landmass at the Atlantic’s cusp, a more habitual form of summer has returned: Leaden skies, horizontal mist and high humidity.
But you didn’t come here to obtain a weather report – there are better places for that sort of thing. But it does go some way to explain the ambient conditions for today’s set of photos, taken in the fine city of Cork, itself no stranger to regular and persistent precipitation.
About a year ago, we reported on the announcement of the Hyundai i30 Fastback, a more rakish, coupé variant of the i30 hatchback. Not that the regular i30 is anything but screamingly normative in a sector which is defined by its utter torpidity, but as we pointed out at the time, it nonetheless is a welcome development on the Korean carmaker’s part to offer something more, how shall we say, urbane?
Today, manfully braving the summer rain for your edification and amusement, I received my first sighting of an i30 Fastback in the wild, if indeed the Western end of Cork’s city centre can be characterised as such. It’s a strikingly handsome car, I have to admit; more so than photos (my rather sodden attempts) and other, more professionally reproduced images or essays might suggest.
Because if the regular i30 hatchback’s styling places the stable genius of Carlsbad’s current works into the sharpest and most unflattering of reliefs, the fastback positively stomps on the Neu-A’s spectacles, simply for the sheer crashing irony of it all. And because it can.
Frankly, this is (unsightly bonnet shutline aside) one very accomplished design – one which would not have looked out of place in the line-up of any German so-called premium stable, had they not stampeded as one towards the baroque lounge. The irony of course is that none of the German marques, premium or otherwise, design cars as calm and clean-limbed as this now. Parked up a few metres away coincidentally, was a new-generation Polo and the difference (and inferiority) in approach was almost embarrassingly palpable.
“I Care About Lines” trumpets Hyundai’s marketing blurb for the i30 Fastback and frankly, viewing this example parked in natural (if somewhat diffused) light, one can more or less concur. Hyundai’s designers, under the assured creative leadership of Peter Schreyer clearly do. Their German big-three counterparts however by comparison, (and the studio where Schreyer cut his stylistic teeth in particular), quite clearly do not.
Driven To Write 
A nice backstop to the article on the Hyundai ‘N’ cars.
And it’s not just the styling, Hyundai/Kia have also poached BMW’s best suspension engineers to fettle the handling.
Hyundai and Kia are taking the old fashioned route to becoming a premium car maker, making better cars than the others.
Good morning Eóin. Apart from the awkward junction of the bonnet shut-line with the base of the A-Pillar that S.V. pointed out in his linked piece, it’s a pretty competent effort. With regard to that junction, this is how they should have resolved it, on the previous generation Peugeot 308:
As Freerk said, there’s a lot going on, but that’s very much the norm these days, and at least some care has obviously been taken to integrate it all harmoniously.
Good morning, Eóin. I still have to see an i30 Fastback in the metal. Looking at your photos I see a car that is definitely above avarage, but as far as I’m concerned it still looks fussy. Too many things going on in too little space.
I’m still not sure why Hyundai, like so many other manufacturers, feels the need to curse the Korean/US-market Elantra with a ridiculous little catflap trunk opening instead of opting for a liftback.
This is not one I´d have much to say about: it´s also a little busy. Hyundai have moved on a lot from this period. That said, it´s a purposeful car if you like what seems to be a medium-sized hatch that looks a bit like a saloon. The category killer in this sector is the Mazda3. I am not sure why anyone is buying any of the others assuming they want a non-crossover. I like the Focus as a runner-up. Absent the Mazda3 I´d call it the most striking of what seems to be a moribund class. The Mazda is daringly simple.