Why Korean Cars Look Better Now

This post was sponsored by a Korean car brand that looks good

Ten years ago, the only Asian cars apart from Protons that I saw on the street were Japanese cars. You’d have your Hondas, your Toyotas and your Mitsubishis. Then again everything Japanese was cool ten years ago. Japanese music, anime, Japanese seaweed and Japanese food. Remember the number of Sushi Kings we had in KL ten years ago?

Loads right? Well now we have Sushi Zanmai, Ichiban Boshis and a whole lot more than the Sushi Kings we had ten years ago.

Of course today we still love our sushi but we’re beginning to see a bit of a shift. Malaysians aren’t as big into Japanese stuff as they are into Korean things. We love our Korean TV dramas, Korean food, Korean beer and for the first time you’re seeing as many Korean cars on the street as you are seeing Japanese cars.

Why? What changed about Korean cars?

Here’s what I found out while doing some research.

Back in 2004, Kia models looked like this.

Yes Korean cars slowly built a reputation of of being reliable and well-built but design wise it left much to be desired.

Then in 2006 Kia hired Peter Schreyer who’s an automobile designer who used to work in VW and Audi before that. He was the guy who designed the famous Audi TT design that was so cutting edge that it still looks good today.

He also designed the VW Beetle, also another design that still doesn’t grow old today.

When Peter Schreyer joined Kia 5 years ago, it was big news for the entire Asian Automobile industry. Everyone waited to see if Kia would come out with cars that looked good and here’s what they ended up looking like.

This is the Kia Forte, a car we’re all familiar with.

A car Shorty test-drove some months back when she was thinking about buying a car. Of all the cars she test-drove, this was one of my favourites. It looked good and it had this little camera on the rear-view mirror that I thought was some Star Trek kinda stuff going on in there. I’m a sucker for gadgets.