(first posted 1/13/2016) To the average owner, the Toyota Corolla is a great car for someone seeking an affordable, reliable, and efficient small vehicle with a low cost of ownership. Of course to the enthusiast, none of these values take high priority, and the Corolla has become the stereotypical poster child of “boring” when it comes to cars. Yet despite this reputation which has only grown stronger in recent years, the Toyota Corolla wasn’t always the definition of boring – at least in the Japanese market.
With its premium Lexus-like looks, “just right” size, and significant refinement over its predecessor and competitors, even in everyday sedan form, the E100 Corolla (and related Sprinter; sold as the Geo Prizm in North America) was an appealing vehicle for its class and quite possibly the best Corolla ever.
Although North and South American only received the sedan and wagon, Europe and Australia/New Zealand also received hatchback and liftback bodystyles. But only in Toyota’s home market of Japan was where the one could have both the sporty Corolla Levin two-door coupe and the sexy Corolla Ceres/Sprinter Marino four-door pillar hardtops.
Although the four-door hardtop was all but extinct among American manufacturers, this bodystyle still enjoyed popularity in the Japanese domestic market in the 1980s through the mid-1990s. The surge in production of four-door hardtops was largely an outcome of the Japanese tax brackets for vehicles, stringently based on exterior dimensions and engine displacement.
(1989 Toyota Corona EXiV hardtop)
Much like their bygone American counterparts, in Japan the hardtop bodystyle conveyed greater prestige and distinction over more pedestrian sedans. Offering four door hardtop counterparts was a way for Japanese manufacturers to sell more luxurious models while staying within a smaller vehicle class.
The Toyota Corolla Ceres (sold exclusively through Toyota Corolla Store channels) and the near identical Toyota Sprinter Marino (sold only through Toyota Auto Store channels) were part of a class of compact four dour hardtops based on economy car platforms that most notably included the Honda Integra (sold in North America under the Acura brand), as well as the Nissan Presea and Mazda Lantis.
Although never officially marketed as “four-door coupes”, as the term was a few years away from being coined, its interesting to note the similarities in design and market positioning to modern four-door coupes. The Ceres/Marino’s swoopy, elegant, and aggressive styling with long hoods, frameless windows, low roof lines and tapering deck lids, greatly evoke the hallmark qualities of today’s popular four-door coupe bodystyle.
Riding on the basic E100 sedan chassis, wheelbase was unchanged at 97 inches. At 171.9 and 66.7 inches, the Ceres’ exterior length and width dimensions were also virtually identical, although height was some two inches lower. All Ceres/Marino models featured a four-wheel independent suspension with a rear stabilizer bar, power steering, and front disc brakes. Over the base F trim, the midlevel X trim added a front stabilizer bar, while the high-end G trim added four-wheel disc brakes with standard ABS. Many of the performance upgrades from the Corolla Levin/Sprinter Trueno coupes, such as unique Super Strut suspension, were also available.
(The original 16-valve 4A-GE; upgraded to 20 valves for use in the Ceres/Marino)
Powering the Corolla Ceres/Sprinter Marino was one of four naturally-aspirated DOHC inline-4s from Toyota’s A-family of engines, corresponding to three trim levels. Available over the entire run of production was the F-grade’s 1.5L 5A-FE and the X-grade’s 1.6L 4A-FE. Both with 16-valves, these engines produced 103.5 horsepower/100 lb-ft torque and 108.5 horsepower/110 lb-ft torque, respectively.
The top-spec G models were initially powered by a 20-valve version of the 1.6 liter, dubbed the 4A-GE. With variable valve timing and a higher compression ratio, the “Silver Top” (a name owed to its silver cam cover with chrome badging) engine initially made a healthy 158 horsepower and 119 pound-feet of torque. 1995 brought a modest horsepower increase to 163, due to an increased compression ratio. This latter version is known as the “Black Top”, as the cam cover changed to black.
A 5-speed manual was the standard transmission for the 5A-FE, 4A-FE, and Siver Top 4A-GE, with a 4-speed automatic available on each. The Black Top 4A-GE gained an exclusive 6-speed manual for the 1997 model year. As with most Toyotas of this period, these cars featured organically styled interiors, with high quality materials, lots of padded surfaces, and optimal ergonomics. Dash designs were also shared with the Levin/Trueno instead of the Corolla and Sprinter sedans.
Befitting of their somewhat upmarket positioning, all Corolla Ceres and Sprinter Marinos featured standard equipment such as power windows, automatic power door locks, deluxe full-cloth seat upholstery and door panels, tilt steering wheel, and projector beam headlights. Higher trim models added automatic climate control, with features such as alloy wheels, power moonroof, rear spoiler available.
The burst of Japan’s asset price bubble and ensuing economic recession forced all Japanese automakers to reduce costs and eliminate less popular models, more strictly focusing on their high-volume sellers. The majority of Japanese four-door hardtops fell victim to this, with the Corolla Ceres and Sprinter Marino included. Most competitors, as well as larger Toyota four-door hardtops such as the Carina ED, Corona EXiV, and Toyota Crown hardtops were gone by the year 2000.
A further side effect of Japan’s economic downturn was that new vehicles released in the ensuing years tended to be more simplistic, less premium, and highly conservative in styling. From big to small, late-1990s Toyotas in particular, fell victim to noticeable cost cutting and less emotional design language.
Toyota doesn’t widely-release its production figures, but due to this vehicle’s niche segment and availability limited to the Japanese market, total production figures were likely only a small fraction of Corolla and Sprinter sedan production. Had this car been sold in North America, albeit a slightly more luxurious interior, it would have made a logical sub-ES300 model for the Lexus brand. Just some food for thought.
Nonetheless, the Corolla Ceres and Sprinter Marino were discontinued without any replacement following a brief 1998 model year. Offering better performance, enhanced luxury, and superior style for a small price premium over their less interesting siblings, it’s a shame that this duo was never sold on international shores. Although examples have not been seen in the metal by many, they will live on in history as outliers to the norm that Corollas can’t be sexy.
Related Reading:
Cool looking cars quite popular here, thousands of them turned up used ex jdm.
I have yet to see one on this side of the Tasman.
However, I’ve seen the coupes and boy they’re cool. And the Sera, but that’s another kettle of fish.
And yet just 6 years later and they’re disappearing rapidly…!
Was about to write just that Scott they are getting rarer.
It boggles my mind they only offered this on their domestic market. Why oh why didn’t they market it abroad? Is there a particular reason for it?
Mazda was very succesful in Europe with their Astina/Lantis, called 323F. At least the Astina was immensly succesful, sometimes I think they sold more of those than regular 323:s. The Successor Lantis was priced out of its range due to the yen going up in the 90’s.
I don’t know about European markets, but as far as the U.S. goes, I strongly suspect that the poor sales of the E90 coupe probably had something to do with it. U.S. buyers liked the plain-vanilla appliance versions of the Corolla, but trying to sell sporty versions of the FWD Corolla didn’t go over well.
Did Mazda sell the hardtop sedan there? I think it looks better than this Toyota.
This Mazda is very interesting and stylish! What model was this?
Mazda Lantis hardtop (Japan only in this body style, the hatchback was referred to as a “coupe” back home but was exported). Not popular at all; Mazda had a ton of internal competition within due to their failed brand expantion plan, and if I remember correctly, the luxury oriented Capella based Eunos 500 handily outsold it.
Reasonably popular in Australia; so much so that I can’t remember what the regular 323 sedan looked like.
Minor corrections: The Sprinter was sold through the Toyota Auto network, not Vista Stores. (The Sprinter was the first Auto model, in fact.) Interestingly, there were two different Mazda Lantis body styles, both four-doors, but they were marketed in Japan as a coupe and a sedan rather than pillared hardtops, although either would have qualified.
A minor but interesting note is that the Ceres and Marino shared the dash of the Levin and Trueno coupes, which is different than the E100 sedan dash. Also, the Ceres and Marino could be ordered with most of the same performance hardware as the E100 coupes (except the 4A-GZE supercharged engine), including the Super Strut suspension.
As I assume anyone here who’s interested already knows, I wrote about the JDM four-door hardtop craze early last year, including these and some other related models. I couldn’t find actual sales figures for these either (although the launch press release has the original projections), but my read of the extended model cycle and lack of replacement is that they either sold well enough to keep them around, but not well enough to justify a new version or sold below expectations such that Toyota extended their model cycle to try to recoup the tooling costs.
As for making it a Lexus, it’s interesting to speculate how that might have turned out. The ES250, also based on a JDM-only hardtop model (the Camry Prominent), didn’t go over too well, but the ES300 was different enough from the subsequent U.S. Camry that buyers and critics were willing to give it a pass. Hard to say.
Thanks for your corrections; I’ve made the necessary amendments to the article.
As you can probably tell, JDM-only cars aren’t my area of strongest expertise. It’s unfortunate that there aren’t many reputable sources of knowledge out there on these cars and others like them. On that note do you happen to know of any good resources for JDM cars?
I’d like to write more about JDM cars and broaden my knowledge. The whole Japanese dealer network channels is something I’d like to someday tackle.
Kiwi boy racers would be a good source of info Brendan, the young car guys here are solidly into these JDM hotrods harvesting the hot powertrains and transplanting them into the mundane models its a whole new ball game to what I grew up with, actual roadholding is a bit behind on these JDM cars compared to what I like/drive but there are cures for that too JDM suspension tune is similar to what goes to the US market they are set up for comfort not handling.
“JDM-only cars aren’t my area of strongest expertise”
Kudos for taking on the story then!
Good resources, yes; in English, less so. (I don’t read much Japanese either, but if you learn the katakana phonetic alphabet — much, much easier than actually learning to read Japanese — you can make a fair amount of sense of brochures and press releases, at least as regards important details.)
When I wrote about the Corolla coupes a while back, I talked about the origins of Toyota’s dealer channels, and Toyota’s own history pages (“75 Years of Toyota,” compiled in 2012) have a wealth of information on that and other subjects of interest.
Oh, if you’re curious, Toyota’s original JDM sales projections for the Ceres and Marino were 96,000 units a year combined (with more than two-thirds of those expected to be the Corolla version). That’s a bit less than they expected for the coupes, but still a pretty healthy figure for JDM-only models, and it tells you why Toyota was able to justify these models. Even on a four-year cycle, that would have been more than 380,000 cars just of this body style.
What we need are English-literate Japanese gearheads, which sounds like a pretty small population. While Japanese are taught English in schools, that doesn’t mean they’re fluent in it, for if you don’t use a foreign language regularly, you lose it, esp. if it’s totally unrelated linguistically.
Easily one of the best looking Corolla based sedans in Toyota’s history. Surprising that Toyota U.S.A. didn’t add a fully-decked out version as the entry level Lexus. At the time, both Acura’s Integra and Infinity’s G20 were generally well received and successful in the marketplace. Seems like a missed opportunity to me. But then again, in current days we’d probably be looking at a leather-lined Lex-arolla with an overdone Predator face, so maybe it’s all for the best. ;->
you see the seca and levin names liberally spattered over the hindquarters of corollas in Oz. Must be one of the ‘most named’ cars out there.
The E100 was “cooked to perfection” as the local kitchen shows love to say. The style still looks good and the best part, they’re dirt cheap. $500 buys you one in decent shape but no rego.
It is interesting to think of this as a small Lexus. The 20 valve engine was just the kind of technically interesting powertrain improvement to justify Lexus pricing. It is what Audi did when the A4 dropped down to the four from the V6 the Audi 90 had.
Perhaps if Mazda had gone ahead with Amati, a fancy Protégé with the 1.8 V6 could have been one of the offerings.
With competition like the above, the four door Integra may have received more attention and not play as much second fiddle to the three door.
All this might have started a real trend. We see today how near lux makers are falling over themselves to come out with ever smaller CUVs.
The E100 Corolla also came in hatch with the 16 valve 2Litre Corona engine JDM only, plenty here and home baked examples too, but if you want to drive quick or just maintain the legal limit on our secondary highways an Amon tuned local Corona is hard to beat for handling value drive one back to back with a JDM model and the difference is chalk and cheese.
This is not correct; the biggest engine in the E100s in Japan was 1,597cc, the most powerful iteration being the supercharged 4A-GZE that was offered on the Levin/Trueno, but not the Ceres and Marino. I’m sure people have swapped the 3S-GE engine into Corollas, but it was NOT a factory option in this generation or the next.
Er, 1,587cc. I can’t type today, apparently.
So the ex JDM Corollas with 2.0 decals factory applied are a myth, maybe they are local assembly but I doubt it.
Of this generation, it’s either wishful thinking or swapping out the drivetrain from a T180 or T200 car. Like I said, I would not be at all surprised if there were such swaps, but Toyota didn’t offer it. I imagine the overlap of the Carina/Corona/V30 Camry range would have been worrisome at that point.
The “20” decals mean its a 20v engine, not a 2.0L capacity engine. Used to fool me too. Similar to the 20v 1.8 Passats and A4’s – badging makes it look like a 2.0L engine.
As a side note on the Mazda front, Mazda did have a pillarless four-door version of the Capella (626), called Persona, although it didn’t use the K-series V-6. Wrong timing, probably, since the Persona was based on the 1987–88 Capella/626.
“Sexy”? I think that’s overstating it a bit.
Just an opinion. To each and their own.
Of course, you’re right on that point. But I equate “sexy” with impractical. You are so correct that it would have neatly slotted into the Lexus line-up of that time.
I guess it depends how impractical you want to be. You sacrifice rear headroom, frameless door glass tends to rattle (especially when part-way down) and in my experience is more susceptible to wind leaks. And you probably lose some trunk space compared to the sedan. I can see that it’s not to every taste, but how much does it need to hurt to qualify?
Frameless door glass is not an inherently sexy, exotic idea, just a bad one.Nearly every practical pig Subaru has them, and it sucks. I’ve seen lots of people actually use the poor pane of free-hanging glass to shut the door! Bad idea…
By the way, Ate up With Motor, you have an awesome site! I dug through everything.
lw: I cringed every time I watched Stephanie closed her door on our Forester by pushing on the glass. She did it for 15 years, and it never created a problem.
Thanks!
I suspect a Corolla-based Lexus was considered but rejected *because* the Integra was so successful; the Legend had a small following among people who wanted luxury devoid of flash, the Vigor never really clicked with the market, but to a great extent for its’ first fifteen years the Integra WAS Acura, its’ volume-seller and the car that made the dealer franchise worth having.
The Integra nameplate had better recognition than the Acura brand, even before tuners started prying the Acura badges off theirs and replacing them with Honda ones.
And that was the rub; Lexus was to be a Japanese Mercedes, the Integra was the car the Pontiac Sunbird was trying to be, and it pulled the entire Acura marque down to the Buick/Mercury/Chrysler level.
This is new to me. I have a minor thing for those JDM 4 door hardtops. And perhaps for JDM models in general. I remain chagrined that we never got a version of the JDM Honda Odyssey here after 1998.
Wow those are pretty. I totally see a baby Lexus ES300, or even a baby LS400 from some angles. Unfortunately it all falls apart when you step inside and get an eyeful of shapeless grey plastic that was endemic in the ’90s. The dash, console, and steering wheel all look like a rental car you didn’t upgrade.
We had a Prism of this generation, you would be surprised how high quality the plastics were.
I do agree that there was a real trend against woodgrain or chrome as dashboard decoration on mainstream cars in the 90s. Of course the automakers were happy to comply, and then limit colors. I don’t think those making the push would realize how austere the results would appear.
My favorite are these two very 90’s Levin:
And this:
Those are quite attractive cars, it really is a shame they weren’t offered here.
After looking at the Toyota Motor Museum piece the other day and perusing the myriad well-styled and inspired designs from the 70’s and 80’s this week I had begun to wonder what happened that led to the “Appliance Era” in Japanese cars, which I had estimated to have begun in the 90’s.
Thanks Brendan for shedding some light on it in the piece above:
(“A further side effect of Japan’s economic downturn was that new vehicles released in the ensuing years tended to be more simplistic, less premium, and highly conservative in styling.”)
Not being a follower of international economic trends, this hadn’t occurred to me. It clarified at least part of the reason behind what I’d been mulling over as a bizarre cultural phenomenon.
Very reminiscent of the last Oldsmobiles.
I see these as a precursor to the Mercedes CLA, which has been very successful. So maybe Toyota missed the boat on this? Or maybe it’s time for a new one?
Maybe Mercedes saw one and thought “Ja! Und anything Toyota can do, ve can do better!”
Ja wir können !!
Hmm…sounds familiar, somehow…
Well, I think it was more that by this time, the Japanese manufacturers had pretty much run the four-door hardtop theme into the ground — it had been a big thing for 20 years when these arrived. The irony, I guess, is that part of the reason Toyota et al moved away from the theme is that the Europeans were not doing it; then the Germans reinvented the idea six or seven years later.
That silver Ceres pictured from the rear looks like an Acura Vigor with an early 90s Infinity J30 grafted rear fascia grafted onto it.
I don’t really buy that this could’ve been a baby Lexus: the G20 was a flop, and the Integra was a sports car. Today’s successful micro-luxury cars (C-class, Audi A3) work because they ape the style of their bigger brothers.
A true pillarless hardtop would’ve been an interesting differentiator, but it seems like the only people who care about those these days are classic car enthusiasts. Now that all cars have a/c, the “windows down” look barely matters. (I say this with great sadness… there are two pillarless hardtops in my garage!)
A pillarless hardtop would make a super-cool Lexus flagship today…. but the only buyers would be CC readers!
Awful lot of G20s around for it to have been a flop. The second generation, maybe…
Good looking car, first time I see it. The Corolla E100 was a popular car in the nineties,
especially the 3- and 5-door hatchback. The 3-door looked a bit like a coupe, and young guys liked it. One with the 1.6 liter engine, and preferably in red. Or black.
C-segment (like the Corolla) are mostly hatchbacks, whereas one segment up (so D-segment) are either sedans or wagons. In the late nineties Toyota offered this first gen Avensis, the T22, introduced in 1997.
The Avensis is a size up from the Corolla; it more or less took the place of the Carina, I think.
Yes, Corolla = C-segment, Avensis = D-segment.
It replaced the Carina E (1992-1997 TA19).
Somewhat reminiscent of the E46 3-Series
That is a good looking car.
A seriously good-looking car, and just what Toyota needed to shake off the “default automotive appliance” image they have.
Looking at that interior picture, I have to wonder how much room there would have been in the back seat though. The seat cushion seems quite scooped out, with the roofline being two inches lower than a regular Corolla….. four door two-plus-two?
These are interesting and attractive cars from a great time in Toyota’s history. The Lexus thought is an intriguing one: I am sure they grappled with the idea of bringing this car over to compete with Integra and G20. My guess is that they were too German-obsessed at the time, and wanted to have a “3, 5, 7” or “C, E, S” strategy–hence ES, GS, LS. A smaller car, though still very nice and loaded with style/features, just wouldn’t have fit with that vision.
Had these as private rental when vacationing in Fiji a few years ago. Good cars but missed my SR20VE powered Infiniti G20 back home.
Agree with the general consensus that this is an attractive car. A bit bloated in appearance, but then again I also like the 91-96 Caprice as well.
I’m not sure how you get ‘bloated’ from that shape. It does look a bit like an ice cream bar that’s been sitting at room temperature for a while, but ‘melting’ doesn’t usually suggest bloating to me (unless you’re lactose intolerant, I suppose!), insofar as the drooping makes it look like it’s shrinking rather than swelling.
That look — the narrowing at both ends — seems to have been very popular in Japan at that point. Other examples would be the A31 Nissan Cefiro, and to a lesser extent the S14 Silvia coupe.
To me, the bloat is most apparent in the covershot – especially when compared with the next shot of the trimmer (but much less attractive) E100.
The rear seats with those cutoff corners are interesting as well, apropos of narrowing ends
So, are you saying the droop of the nose and tail makes the hardtop’s greenhouse look more bulbous even though it’s actually somewhat lower and ‘faster’ than the sedan’s? (I’m not trying to be obstreperous — I’m curious how you’re reading it.)
No, the body appears to have bloated under a shrunken greenhouse. I suppose my mention of the Caprice with that body’s bloated greenhouse was not such a direct analogy.
You obstreperous? Pish to that I say. hehehe
Interesting one, not something I can recall seeing although there are other JDM Toyota sedans around.
At the same time as these Toyota Australia were selling the imported Corolla Sprinter liftback alongside the locally produced Corollas, and costing up to $32-38k (didn’t sell well, strangely…).
As far as bloated styling goes, this car is longer and wider than the normal Corolla but on the same wheelbase, with more extravagant curves. Before the Corolla started to grow into what used to be called a mid-size car!
I’d say it was the Japanese recession that stopped cars like this. The poor economy meant fewer people would spend the extra money over a ‘normal’ Corolla, and few of the sales would have been incremental/conquest, so there is little return for the development cost.
The Ceres looks nice , but I’m really liking that white Corona EXiv . I don’t get how some people hate on Japanese design , some of the JDM models over the years look very good to my eye.
Wow! I love the Corolla EXiV hardtop sedan! It’s such a shame we could not get these in Canada or the U.S.
Pretty nice-for a Corolla. Is it a true pillarless hardtop, or are just the door frames pillarless? Hard to tell from the pictures.
It’s not pillarless, although all but the last generation of Carina ED/Corona EXiV were.
Fantastic-looking car from the rear angles, but the nose leaves me a bit cold. the wide headlights are fine, but that basic horizontal-bar grille just doesn’t work–methinks it might have been better with a “grilleless” nose, though that also would have looked rather like the 2nd-gen Integra.
And in the third photo down, of that blue Marino, I’m immediately reminded of the 1997-2005 generation Buick Regal.
Thanks for the very informative article . I own a manual transmission 1993 Toyota Marino with a 4a Fe engine .
I wold like to know the basic difference(s) between the Marino / Ceres .
I really love the performance vs fuel economy of this car .
It’s hard to get a used one online . When you do get one it’s almost 4000 US $ !
I’m from a country called Uganda found in East Africa .
Thanks in advance .
Is it just me, or does this car look like a four-door version of a Nissan 240SX/Skyline/S14?