Whilst Europe escaped most of the Federal bumper legislation, the Duetto was similarly scarred here too. I'm not particularly fond of the later generation with the plastic bumpers either, they looked too heavy for the car - the shape really needed those delicate chrome bumpers to be at its best.

On the subject of Federal legislation, what was with the Mr Magoo spec side repeaters too? Did double nickel speed limits mean no-one was ever going fast enough to have to concentrate, so indicators needed to be as obvious as possible?! Plenty of pretty cars had their flanks scarred with those monstrosities.

The Testarossa was a product of what was probably not Ferrari's proudest moment in its history. Though they refined and updated it over its lifetime until it was almost a very good driver's car, it was pretty much a case of polishing a turd (as the saying goes) and was always a car that said things about its driver that they wouldn't necessarily want to hear. Mondial and 412 aren't among the pantheon of the best Ferraris of all time either, so it fell to the 328 to uphold the company's honour at the time. That, for me, was a rare case of improving on the original design - I find the (non-US) bumpers tidier and better resolved with the overall design than they were on the 308. And you were less likely to be mistaken for an Hawaiian PI of course.

There's an interesting Flash on Ferrari's site of what they call design "evolution":

http://www.ferrari.com/English/GT_Sport Cars/Classiche/Pages/Classiche.aspx

The link breaks at the space, you might need to copy & paste the whole thing into your browser. Interesting start and end points - the 166 Inter wasn't the prettiest of Ferraris at the time and whilst I do find the Enzo attractive, it's because it looks technical rather than conventionally attractive. But note, they go straight from 365 BB to F40, the Testarossa has no place here either... Probably every company doing anything for a long enough time has a duffer or two in its range. Perhaps that's part of the attraction of the 60s and 70s where Heuer is concerned, they weren't really putting out any duffers. Maybe that's rose tinted too, but the impression is definitely way more hits than misses.

Jeff has a great point with designs often striking lightning first time out and then being diluted over time. The 328 over the 308 is an exception, perhaps, although maybe the first revision is often the "right" one and it goes downhill from there too.

To drag myself back to watches, we have the first Carrera:

Lauded amongst other things for its clarity and simplicity.

Right the way through to the current day:

What price now clarity and simplicity?