You think you know everything about Japanese cars, but that's impossible. Toyota is viewed in America as a somewhat boring car company that makes family sedans and wagons, but over in JDM land, things are a little different.
Over there, the Scion FR-S is known as the Toyota GT 86, named after that legendary drift car in Initial D. It's even more of a cult car and gets treated to numerous body kits. Our favorite one from the aftermarket scene is made by Aimgain and resembles the Lexus LFA.
But, Toyota does a great job of customizing the sports coupe as well. They have a long list of goodies you could buy from the TRD parts catalog. These goodies range from air intakes and exhaust systems to full body kits.
There is also a classic alternative, one that we think resembles early versions of the Jaguar XK coupe, the one that had a much smaller V8 engine. The nose of the GT 86 has been completely redesigned with more curves. An oval grille is placed at the bottom of the bumper, almost looking like the mouth of a bottom-feeding shark.
Other elements required a redesign as well, such as the rear bumper and trunk. Toyota even changed the shape of the exhaust mufflers, adding tapered trapezoidal tips. Unfortunately, they didn't do too much to the taillights.
We first saw the GT 86 Style Cb at the 2014 Tokyo Auto Salon in January that year. A chance encounter with the car on Youtube reminded us how awesome it looked, and we decided to share it with you guys once again.
If you're looking to buy one of these, you should know that they are extremely rare and quite expensive. You can expect to pay ¥4,180,582($35,000/€31,000) or ¥4,263,055 ($34,300/€31,500) if you want it with an automatic gearbox.
For that kind of money, you also get a new set of wheels and a hand-painted two-tone paintjob. The interior also adopts a few retro touches, so we think it's worth the investment if you can afford one.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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