Autoblog

Click the image above for a gallery of the Ford Verve Sedan concept.

Ford's Verve Sedan concept rappelled to the ground in a smoky haze here in Detroit and the four-door concept proved to be a bit more squat, and less dynamic, in person. The Kinetic design language melds well with the compact sedan, looking more like a Mondeo at 2/3rds scale, which isn't a bad thing. But we're hoping for something a bit more sporting (like it's little brother that ran around the stage) and the Verve didn't quite deliver.

For all the details on the Verve Sedan you check out our previous post, and enjoy the two galleries of live and press shots below.

click either image to view high-res galleries

The ever increasing importance of the Chinese auto market is on full display this week at the 2007 Guangzhou Motor Show, and fortunately we have the Autoblog Chinese crew pounding the show floor as we speak. You can check out their coverage here (translated courtesy of Google), although for those not fluent in Chinese (like us) you'll have settle for looking at all the pretty pictures. Yesterday we told you about the debut of both the Mazda2 sedan and Ford Verve Sedan Concept at the Guangzhou show, and today we have live shots from the show floor courtesy of Autoblog Chinese. Technically these two cars are very much related, as the Verve concept is expected to inspire a production car of the same name that will be sold in the U.S. and markets abroad. That new small car will be based on the same platform as the Mazda2, and after the strong showing of four-doors in China this week, we bet a sedan version of the production Verve is certainly being planned alongside a three-door hatch. Click any image below to view either gallery of high-res shots taken from the floor of the 2007 Guangzhou Motor Show.

Gallery: Mazda2 Sedan


Gallery: Ford Verve Sedan Concept

Click image for photo gallery

The Mazda2 sedan isn't the only new notchback on display at the Guangzhou Motor Show. It's got some company in the form of its Ford-branded cousin, the Verve. Parked onstage along with the 3-door unveiled in Europe earlier this year, the Verve notchback sedan sheds its predecessor's rear hatch and gains two doors and a trunk. The new rear treatment is extremely evocative of the Mondeo, and that's a good thing. In fact, the Verve (in this particular Autoblogger's opinion, at least) is better-looking than the similar Mazda2 4-door that also made its debut today. The Verve trifecta will be completed at the Detroit Auto Show in January, where we'll see the Americanized version in concept form. After looking at the 2008 Ford Focus, we fully expect every cool Ford Europe kinetic design feature to be jettisoned in favor of a ham-handed implementation of the "bold" American-market Gillette Mach 3 cues. Here's hoping we're wrong.

[Source: Ford via EGMCartech]