Photo Friday: No Sexy Lines

One of the things that drew me into buying my Ford Focus, in 2012, was that it was a good looking car. It had interesting curves, especially around the headlights and taillights.

It had sexy lines.

The other front runners, while DW and I were car-shopping, were the Hyundai Elantra and the Honda Civic. In 2012, the Civic was a Plain Jane (my apologies to all the Janes out there), both inside and out. The Elantra had nicer lines than the Honda, but neither came close to the look of the Ford Focus hatchback.

And when the dealership had a white Focus in its showroom, in the Titanium trim level with a bonus, black-and-white leather interior, I fell in love.

Let me be clear: the look of a vehicle is not the determining factor in what I buy. A vehicle must be, first and foremost, safe. It has to protect my family in the case of a collision. Second, the car must be fuel-efficient. With the cost of gas in 2012, I wanted a car that wouldn't need to be filled up more than once a week, based on our average driving to work and for local errands.

The third factor is that the car has enough standard features/conveniences. This factor is flexible, depending on the cost for each trim level and extras. And this factor also ties into the overall cost of the car, though I know how much I can afford before I start shopping so I limit my choices to that budget.

All three vehicles—the Honda, Hyundai, and Ford—met all of these requirements. And so, all things being relatively equal, I went for the final criterion: I had to like how the vehicle looked, I had to feel comfortable being seen in the car.

Of the three choices, I liked the look of the Focus the best.

When we had the car home, I took a lot of photos of the vehicle. In the autumn evening, the sunsets made the white car glow. One year after we took delivery of the Focus, on a fall afternoon, the family and I drove up to Gatineau Park and walked the trail that circles Pink Lake. On that autumn afternoon, the leaves were lit up in bright reds, oranges, and yellows.

When we returned to the car, I noticed a lone, red maple leaf had fallen onto the hood of the car, next to the headlight. The contrast, against the white paint, mixed with the curve of the headlight, made it irresistible to the photographer in me.

Here's the picture. I swear that I didn't move the leaf.

Four weeks ago, today, we walked away from the Ford. Over the seven and a half years that we owned the vehicle, it was a love-hate relationship. We loved how it looked. We hated the mounting problems with the car, from the transmission to the electrical components. When it did work, we loved how it handled; when it didn't work properly, we hated how it handled.

Again, we found ourselves shopping for a new vehicle. And again, we had our three criteria on our list. We found that all of the cars we were looking at met the same safety standards. This time, when it came to fuel efficiency, we fully researched electric vehicles, versus plug-in hybrids (PHEVs), versus full hybrids.

Though our initial intent was to go full electric, none of the vehicles met our budget. We then considered a PHEV, but when we looked at ranges and the additional cost, we decided that full hybrid was the way to go. We narrowed our choices to two hybrids, though they were very different vehicles.

We had to make a choice: replace the Focus with an equal car style or go for something more, that could also replace our SUV, when the time would ultimately come for us to go full-electric.

The first choice, a Hyundai Ioniq, was better looking, in my opinion. I could see myself driving it. The other choice, a Kia Niro, in my eyes, was pretty plain looking. I didn't like the front end and the back end reminded me of a VW, and wasn't outstanding.

The Niro—our ultimate choice—lacked sexy lines. But that's not why I buy a vehicle.

For me, the interior of the Niro is good-looking. It's a practical vehicle with loads of great features. And I do love the look of the dashboard's instrument cluster: it's so clean, so easy to read.

Finding a good angle to photograph the exterior is tough for me. I thought of that autumn shot of the Focus, with the leaf next to the headlight, and I thought, those are sexy lines.

I looked at the headlights on the Niro and tried to duplicate the shot, without the leaf.

Nope. No sexy lines.

What do you think? What car have you owned that you thought was sexy (no supercars, please)?

Happy Friday!