Wednesday, January 5, 2011

the Citroën 2CV - the French equivalent of the Morris Minor


The Citroën deux chevaux (two horse[power]) was produced from 1948 to 1990, supposedly designed to "move the French peasantry on from horses and carts." The photo from netcarshow.com, likely a publicity view of the time, shows a 1963 Berline model, maybe in the hills of the Massif Central.

The car's quirky design has ensured that it has developed a legion of fans around the world, including in NZ: below is one of our photos taken in Oriental Bay, Wellington.  Whenever one is parked on the street, it doesn't take long for a passerby to pull a camera out!

The BBC's Antiques Roadshow programme for a while had a 2CV driving along a British road with a grandfather clock sticking out of the sunshine roof for its closing title sequence.  This was later replaced with a Morris Minor, and in a way the two cars are the national equivalents of each other.

2 comments:

Funny old world said...

Hi,
I've just been the successful bidder in an auction for the 2cv that appeared in the antiques roadshow on BBC. The original filming was on a road through the black mountains in Cymru/Wales. I live in north wales so the little car will be seen out and about on similar roads, hopefully for many years to come.
The 2cv has been named Herman by previous owners
so I'll stick with Herman. French built 1984 registered 1985.

transpress nz said...

Congratulations!
if you send us a pic, we will post it.