We finally have put a deposit on our new car - woo! It is a silver grey 2005 Toyota Corolla with a grey interior - used with very few km’s on it, so it’s practically a new car. It is also a very bland-looking car. I’m thinking that I would like to decorate the car on the outside - possibly with some bright blue pinstriping and small blue butterflies.
What do all y’all think? How would you decorate a nice new silver car being driven by a 38 year old white lady? Anybody have any good sites for mail-order car decals? Any tips?
When I had the pink flamingos put on my white Wrangler, it cost less than $100 for two colors (the flamingo was standing in a pool of blue water - the guy did it to match one of my tattoos). Check in the yellow pages under automotive - some of the collision repair shops may be able to give you some leads. I had my windscreen done on my latest Wrangler - and had it done by a place that specializes in signs and banners. With the computer programs they have now they can do almost anything, and if you have it professionally done you don’t have to worry as much about it peeling or flaking.
As I drove through Santa Fe many years ago, a 40-ish woman driving a volvo pulled up next to me at a stoplight.
I glanced over and started laughing. She had glued HUNDREDS of little plastic animals to her car. They were all over the hood, facing forward as if bracing themselves in the wind. They were on the hood, on the side mirrors, on the trunk, and on the dashboard.
I was still laughing when I looked at the driver, who was looking back at me and smiling.
Alternatively, you could make a bunch of your own custom bumper stickers at this site I found a few years ago. They may offer custom images of butterflies and whatnot, too.
I suggest you don’t because cars don’t usually do well with add on body pieces. You can go from stock elegance to designed by Tonka very quickly.
I suggest tinting the windows. It doesn’t have to be very dark, there are lots of light to medium shades available. Make sure you get black/grey tint as opposed to silver or brown given the colours of your car. It will help give a richer look as well as offer some glare protection on sunny days. Get it professionally done - Not DIY where you get that cheap bubbled lepper effect on the glass.
If you must pin stripe, do a subtle colour. High contrast colours just cheapen the look. You can get pin striping with a bit of flair (like a girly tattoo) Make sure this is professionally applied as well. If the striping begins to come off one day… and it will… remove all of it. Nothing looks worse than molting pin stripes. Except those spinny hub cap thingies. DON’T even think about it!
I’m from the school of less is more when it comes to pimping your ride. If you must decorate, stick to self expression in your home.
Oh, and no car doylies and stuffed animals all over the dash and rear deck. Makes me worry toddlers jacked the teacher’s car and she’s tied up in the trunk.
Congrats on the new ride! Drive it like it’s stolen.
You don’t see as many of these dashboard layouts any more, because of the front passenger airbags. At least you shouldn’t. I HAVE seen a new car (equipped with a front passenger airbag) with an array of little plastic thingamobobs glued on top of it, clearly a cherished collection that the car owner transferred from the old vehicle. Which would of course result in a chest full of Smurfs or whatnot driven at high velocity into the torso of the passenger if the airbag ever deployed…
No spinning hubcap things? But I love the spinning hubcap things!
I don’t think I’ll go with small animals glued all over my car, but thanks for the thought, Marge. We won’t be decorating the inside except for a couple of blue seat covers and a nice steering wheel cover, either - we both think lots of interior decoration in a car is both tacky and dangerous.
My husband doesn’t particularly want to drive a car with butterfly decals on it - well, TFB, baby, he got the last new car three years ago, and I kept on driving the junker. Maybe I’ll find some nice butterfly magnets and just take them off when he’s driving.
I’ll try to find the picture of the hearse a folk artist in the area has “transformed”. guaranteed to make you say “whaaaa” and go have a drink if you see it on the road.
My own car is pretty thoroughly pimped. Those are custom rims and the flame stripes are vinyl – but they were installed by the dealer, so I don’t know where they came from. Inside the car, I have more yet more pimping. It’s hard to see, but I have jewels on all the dash knobs – yes, jewels, don’t give me a hard time about it… I like it!. The flame decal on the air bag cover, I bought from www.streamlinedesign.com and put on myself – it was really easy to apply and looks good. They have a lot of pretty pinstripe motifs in pretty colors. Good prices and customer service, too, in my experience.
I love those spinning rims, BTW – very expensive, though. My retro-look smoothies were bad enough ($600 including shipping and powdercoating) – a good set of spinners would have cost me around twice that. Plus I’d have had to kill my husband to get them (he drives a plain gray Passatt without so much as an antenna ball or bumper sticker) – he’s been very indulgent of my silliness with this car, but would have drawn the line at spinners!
Speaking of mirror finishes, my husband showed me this picture of a this Audi - the aluminum is buffed to a high shine and coated with a clear varnish. Pretty sweet.
Jess, that’s kind of what I was thinking of - some high-contrast pin-striping or design.
BTW, in addition to the flame pinstripe on the inside, I have applied regular pinstripe from Streamline. My mom has a PT Cruiser like mine (only green), and wanted to pimp it a bit. So we got gold pinstriping for all around it and a pinstripe design for the back hatch – very easy and very cheap. Something like $35.00 for everything, which included the exterior pinstriping, plus a smaller design for the inside airbag cover plus several other silly things.
I guess fuzzy dice dangling from the rear view mirror and a racoon tail on the antenna are pretty much out of the question, aren’t they? How about blue dot tail lights? Neon tube surrounding the license plate? A little dog that nods its head on the package tray?
