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Journal: Promoting Japan's First Exotic

Promoting Japan’s First Exotic

By Petrolicious Productions
April 10, 2013
9 comments

You already know we love vintage brochures for the way they help illuminate a car in a period-correct shade of light, but it still takes a special car and a good design layout to make promo material stand out. The Toyota 2000GT is easily special enough to fill one of those shoes, while the unknown graphic designer and photographers of this great period brochure take credit for the rest.

Considered by many to be the most beautiful Japanese car ever built, it was a hand-built exotic with the type of engineering sophistication you’d expect of a car more costly than a new E-type. We’ve seen a few in person, and pictures simply do not convey the GT’s incredible level of detailing and its elegance of proportion, let alone how small it really is—think ¾ scale 240Z.

Anyone read Japanese?

Photo Source: images from Product Design Database

Tags 2000GT/ Japanese/ Toyota/ Vintage Brochures/ Vintage Friday
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Burt Munro
Burt Munro(@m100tt)
8 years ago

I remember this (likely this car) from when I was a kid and the parents bought their first Toyo in 1977. One sat on the showroom floor at Lou Fusz in STL, which recently sold for about $300K if memory serves.

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Dan Woodward
Dan Woodward(@woody)
8 years ago

There aren’t many Jap motors which really speak to me, but this is up there with the best of anything from Continental Europe. I remember seeing one at the Louwman museum in the Netherlands and I just couldn’t stop staring.

Magnificent.

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paulmose
paulmose(@paulmose)
8 years ago

I just saw my first “in the flesh” Thursday, it is being offered locally by R&M Auctions as part of the Don Davis Collection auction. I was shooting Mr. Davis, and was lucky enough to get a really close look at his incredible car. It is small, and just so cool, and so sad they didn’t make more. If I had big $$$$$!

The car can be seen at R&M’s website (I am not connected to them).

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JanMichael Franklin
JanMichael Franklin(@jmfranklin)
8 years ago
Reply to  paulmose

Of course, this car went on to sell for well over $1M! The most ever for a Japanese car!

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Andrew Adamides
Andrew Adamides(@baskingshark)
8 years ago

I want a 2000GT SO badly – I want to drive round in it wearing classic ray-bans and a polo-neck, accompanied by Ursula Andress c.1965 in her Courreges outfits from La Decima Vittima, listening to Pizzicato Five. Occasionally, we could stop to solve very stylish crimes.

Also, because this is a complete fantasy, I would actually fit into the 2000GT, which is a tiny little car and not exactly suited to being driven by anybody over about 5’5’…

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ACFowles
ACFowles(@acfowles)
8 years ago

A fabulous and iconic car. However, not as small as you suggest as (if the diagram above is correct) it is virtually the same length and width as a 240Z. So, it smaller than an E-Type, bigger than a GT6 but in a different league in terms of engineering.

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JanMichael Franklin
JanMichael Franklin(@jmfranklin)
8 years ago
Reply to  ACFowles

I was going to point out the nearly identical proportions to the 240Z as well.

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Johannes Roussel
Johannes Roussel(@johannes)
8 years ago

One of the most desirable car of it’s time….

…

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yoshi234
yoshi234(@yoshi234)
8 years ago

what a beauty!

I can barely read the small text. Would it be possible to see a higher res of the text?

yoshi – who now lives close to the Toyota museum and plans to visit asap

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