They say French luxury cars died out. After the war anyway. The golden era of Bugatti, Delage and Salmson was brutally interrupted. Not by bad engineering but by bad timing. Rationed petrol. A sluggish economy. And the government slapping stiff taxes on anything labeled non-essential. The upper crust starved. The revival didn’t really kick in until the sixties.
But from the clunkers to the icons, let’s look at the saloons French makers pushed out between 1960 and roughly 2020.
The Rambler stumble (1962)
For most of the fifties, the Renault Fregate sat pretty high. Ponton bodywork gave it an edge over the aging Citroen Traction Avant. Then the Citroen DS debuted at the 195 Paris motor show. The DS was avant-garde. It changed the game instantly. Renault needed a response. Fast.
Instead of building a proper executive saloon they turned to America. American Motors Corporation became their partner. AMC sent kits across the Atlantic. Renault assembled them in Belgium. The result? The Rambler.
It had a 3.2-liter straight-six. 129 bhp. Sounds decent on paper. The market said no. Too expensive to buy. Too expensive to run. The styling? Too American for French eyes. Charles de Gaulle supposedly rejected an armored version as his presidential ride. An embarrassment for the brand.
Finding the French touch (1965)
Renault saw the Rambler failing. So they brought in Gaston Juchet. They told him to fix the image. He threw out the old three-box design. Introduced the hatchback concept before anyone knew it was cool. He called it the Renault 16.
The underpinnings were clever. Front-wheel drive. A layout seen in smaller models like the 3 or 4. But here? It felt luxurious. Automatic transmission was available. Fuel injection. Power windows and locks. The Rambler got quietly dropped in 1965, leaving the 16 as the undisputed king.
It wasn’t a short reign. Production stretched from 1965 to 1980. The 20 and later the 30 were meant to replace it, launching in 1975, but the 16 just refused to die. Nearly two million units. Sold in dozens of countries. Even the United States took them. Was this the peak? Probably not but it was steady.
The Monica gamble (1972)
By the late sixties, Facel Vega was gone. Jean Tastevin, an industrialist, wanted a piece of the glory days back. He wanted a car that could stare down a Jaguar or a Maserati. Or even a Mercedes-Benz. He hired former Formula One driver Chris Ainsworth to help with the design.
They named it Monica. For Tastevin’s wife Monique. And 560 for the engine displacement.
The car made its first public appearance in 1972 at the Paris show. It evolved rapidly. Early prototypes looked a bit like a stretched Panhard. Used a Ted Martin V8. Messy. But the production model showed up in 1973 with a sleek, wedge-shaped body. It packed a Chrysler V8 of 5.6 liters. Big. American power under French skin. It was an ultra-luxurious bid. Did it stick around? No. But for a brief moment, it existed.
