I’ve been shooting and posting Festivas since the earliest days of CC, when they had clearly established themselves as the shitbox of choice hereabouts. They were all over the place, like little baby roaches that wouldn’t and couldn’t be killed. The party has slowly wound down these past few years, to the point where seeing this one actually got me to stop. Are there any others still around?
The bright red paint and the owner-added decorations made it even more compelling. This festival will end, one of these days.
Let’s take a closer look. This guy riding up on the roof has a sprig of fresh lilac blooms in his hand. Yes, spring is in full glory and the lilacs are doing their aromatic thing.
This owner clearly thinks life is a party, and a colorful one at that.
How I miss the good old days when so many Eugene-mobiles sported a full complement of stickers. No more; folks are taking themselves and their fancy new RAV4 hybrids and Tesla Model Ys way too seriously.
This is a genuuuine Festiva GT.
When the back is out of room, there’s always the sides.
Who would have thought that a little Mazda built by Kia in Korea would turn out to be such a long-lived thing?
And no; they weren’t lacking in driving fun. Its 58 hp managed to scoot the 1720 lb hotbox from 0-60 in a mere 10.2 seconds. And through the quarter in 17.8 seconds. Faster than just about anything in its price class. And there’s a lot more room inside than its 136″ length might suggest.
It’s the ultimate antithesis to all the bloated CUVs nowadays. I’m going to be bummed when they’re all gone.
More Festiva reading here:
Curbside Classic: Ford Festiva – A Festival of Longevity, And How To Live In Your Festiva
I owned TWO of em, 1990 models that were upgraded from carb to FI and from 4 speeds to 5. Wonderful cars, fun to drive thanks to being essentially a Mazda 121 (which was never sold here). Zoom-Zoom baby. Not slow, as they had 4 whole cylinders when some competitors had only 3.
That one, however, is ridiculous looking.
Why should a three-banger be any slower than a four? A 1-liter Daihatsu 3 is known for running circles around a Suzuki 4 of equal displacement
I don’t know that it SHOULD be but at the time it would smoke for example a 3 cyl Justy or Metro.
This is waaaaaay before a GRolla and the like.
Oh and you called it – one of my DD’s present day is a RAV4 Hybrid 🙂
(also a Prius)
Remember testing one when new as a second car. Armstrong steering only in Canada. Boy did they need the power steering option that was available to our American friends. Would have bought if not for that manual steering. I remember commenting previously that this was the only “Ford” that Consumer Reports recommended for several years. Kia was getting it right long before we new who they were.
Mark neither of mine had PS and you could twirl that steering wheel with a pinky finger!
My current Miata R-pkg also has manual steering, and people LOVE that however the Festiva had much lighter steering by comparison.
I saw one, just yesterday! Reminded me of its predecessor, the far superior Fiesta. Mom had one when I was in high school. Loved driving that little car.
My first car. The Best.
Mazda was committed to engineering the perfect daily commuter that one could camp in, shop in, easily put four people in, have a blast driving, and deliver 45 miles per gallon. There was a commitment to delivering a high quality ride.
In the US – we screwed this up a bit. We had to have automatic transmissions instead of the fabulous 5 speed manuals. We had to have those dumb automatic seat belts that raced over your shoulder and choke you, but you still needed to buckle a seat belt – stupid.
Mine was the first year and top of the line. Storage box under the passenger seat, normal three point seat belts, five speed, wider tires, better wheels, nicer interior, split-back rear seats, remote control passenger mirror, four speaker stereo cassette system, and full instrumentation with tach.
The ride is quick and calm. I loved buzzing around San Francisco and never struggling to find a parking spot. The manual launched the little car upwards over the most demanding hills. The wider tires are a must, although they were far more costly. You needed the extra width to hug the curves with confidence. I had taken that car from SF to NYC, to Eastport Maine, down to Miami. With the split back seat folded back into the trunk and the front seats reclined – a single air mattress turned the Festiva into an overnight camping vehicle. The little back windows even popped open for ventilation.
I thought the car would be disposable. That is because the other new cars I had were. I expected to pay off the $6,669 Festiva LX, and then trade it in on a larger, nicer, car. I didn’t want to. I had too much fun. I kept it 12 years and ended up with 250,000 miles on it. Traded it in, and it was still on the road a decade later. By then, it was all used up and had been loved to death.
Nothing broke on it. Just replaced the exhaust system which back then weren’t what they are now – cost very little to do that. Tires – I bought the best because the car helped me afford to buy the best. The interior never wore out.
For the longest time, my Festiva became my parent’s tow vehicle for their RV. They camped in Breckenridge Colorado for the summer, and used the Festiva to do all their mountain climbing trail heads. At 1900 pounds, the Festiva climbed any mountain with ease. The manual made that possible.
Most of the ones today have automatics. Those suck. They have little wheels. Those blow. They have a bagain basement interior. Those stink. Yet – if I could find one today, I would take it home. It is the perfect little toy car to park in the back of the garage, or park in a kid’s play house. Which, by the way, I don’t know a single kid under the age of 10 who doesn’t love these little toy cars.
Ah, a true testimonial.
I’ve never owned or even driven one, but have long wondered what it’d be like. Here in the Great Lakes (salt belt) area, Craigslist gives evidence of a little subculture of devotees, selling each other parts or going the “two cars to make one good one” route, etc.
I’ll keep my eyes open in traffic this week for any “CC effect”!
Despite many writing these off as a nothing more than a joke, it’s hard not to think they got the last laugh. For such “disposable” vehicles, I still see enough around to think otherwise, and the same could be said for Geo Metros of the era.
We also laugh at the idea of a Festiva “GT”, but as was customary for many, many small cars in Japan, there was a performance model, and it was in fact a GT (or GT-A / GT-X). Powered by a Mazda “BJ” series 1290cc DOHC 16-valve four (essentially a simplified short-stroke version of the original Miata’s B6) producing 88ps at 7000rpm, they could give a Suzuki Cultus (Swift) GTi a serious run for for the money as they were even lighter still. Another desirable feature we missed was a power folding canvas roof, which when combined with the DOHC motor, likely made for a very compelling package:
Indeed, there’s a cadre of Festiva buffs out there swapping other Mazda B-family engines (or entire powertrains) into these, which I gather are pretty much a direct nut’n’bolt swap, right up to the B6T 1.6L turbo engine with a 16v DOHC head, good for 132 hp and 136 lb-ft of torque (most commonly salvageable from a Mercury Capri XR2 roadster here).
Then of course there’s the infamous SHOgun Festivas, which applied the Renault R5 Turbo formula by stuffing the entire powertrain from a Taurus SHO into the back end of a Festiva.
”Dumb automatic seat belts that raced over your shoulder” Fortunately here in Canada
we didn’t have them.
Lots of cars had the Mad Mouse belts, and it was a stopgap measure to include mandated “passive” restraints before Airbags could be phased in. Govt’s fault, not the car’s fault. It took longer for some models due to needing a redesign. I had a Grand Am coupe with the belts mounted to the door, the idea being “hey these count as passive” since in theory you could leave them belted all the time. In practice nobody did because climbing in through the web of belts sucked.
This was all around 1990 and if you think back, cars like the 90 Grand Am had the goofy belts and the 90 Festiva had the motorized, but the 90 Miata came out with an Airbag from the start. Woulda been darn tough to do anything “passive” on a convertible anyway…..
Man, I remember those Ford commercials on TV the year the Festiva came out.
That “It’s a Foooooord. It’s a FesTIVa!!” earworm still has power. Perhaps due to the fact that each commercial needed to repeat the line twice. In succession.
I’ll argue that these *were* a worthy successor to the Fiesta. Both were light, fun-to-drive, and quite tossable. They weren’t quite as good as a Fiesta in a few ways, but Korea was still fairly new at building cars at that point.
If I recall correctly, the main “problem” with the Fiesta was currency exchange rates such that if Ford wanted to continue selling the Fiesta in the US, the price would have been higher than the new-for-1980 Escort, and that just didn’t make sense.
This one has character going for it.
And yes, there are more around. See the Cohort dating from 2/1/24 to 4/8/24 I found 2 of them in the travels ’round these parts.
I never thought much of them until I saw one with wider rims and tires like this one, then I though heeyyyy, that’s kind of cool.
Certainly way better than the irredeemable Aspire that came later.
I’ll bet the owner would be interesting to have a coffee with, just not at Starbucks 😉
The Canadian ads for the Festiva contained a memorable Fest-tiv-aaa! jingle.
I ran across another one of those Canadian ads for the Festiva when looking for the US ad that I linked to above. It took me a bit to figure out just what that sound was when the hood/doors/hatch were slamming open and shut. It’s a blare of kind of Mariachi music, right?
I wonder why we got a whole different marketing campaign down here (featuring Yuppies instead of faux-Ford-engineers and “Mexican” music). Maybe Ford didn’t want folks in the States to think that their Festiva was made in Mexico? (which it wasn’t)
There’s probably some story there.
In the 1980’s, when my revered Scirocco was often costing me $1000 a year in service and repairs, friends with a Festiva raved about their choice for both fun and frugality.
Love the stickers…’Middle-Aged Queers’ and ‘start a f*cking band’ had me snorting all morning. 🙂
I’m thinking Portland’s ‘The Thermals’ in their heyday were likely a staple on the CD/cassette player.
Was this model built by Kia back then? It was the cheapest product in FOMCO. I remember it was even cheaper than Mercury Tracer which was a Mazda 323 made in Taiwan.
The next attempt from Ford on mini vehicle in US was Fiesta, an excellent vehicle except Ford decided to put its premature DSG transmission on this car. But if you get a manual transmission, you have super mini for your daily dash. Some people claim its ST model can beat VW GTI on track
Yes a Mazda 121 made by Kia. And I also had a Tracer, another great car. Of course a 121-based car would be cheaper than one based on the 323. My Tracer was the top of the line, LS or LX or whatever they called it, with super comfy velour interior and even had courtesy lights on the doors. Truly a Mini Mercury. Mine was a 3-door stick.
Whatever its inherently good qualities, I will always associate the Festiva with the 1999 film, “Election”, starring Matthew Broderick and Reese Witherspoon. Broderick plays high school civics teacher Jim McAllister who faces a middle-age crisis as he pursues a love-hate affair with Witherspoon, who was cast as Tracy Flick, an overachieving, patently ambitious student running for election as student body president. The car becomes a running joke, symbolizing Broderick’s character’s uncoolness, losing a stoplight race to some of his students driving their mother’s car, the less than sexy chariot in which he drives Tracy to a motel to consumate their affair, and just about the only asset he is left with as part of his divorce settlement when everything comes crashing down. This was all done to great, understated comic effect, effectively underscoring McAllister’s awareness of his status as one of life’s losers. I highly recommend the movie, with apologies to those who knew the Festiva best.
Omg Middle-Aged Queers is my friend’s band in Oakland! How cool!! I’ve also guested on some vocals for them…love this
A real car for me, and a Festiva for the rest of ya!
No, a friend had a 121 many moons ago, and it was a proper gem. All the plaudits above ring true, and I’d add that Mazda did an excellent job with the styling, what with the fared arches front and back and that very steep bonnet. Do wish someone clever could design a safe version of it for 2024. Alas, I suspect that the unthinkably large forces that have to act upon the cabin structure once the front has crumpled up have precluded fine greenhouses forever (let alone side protection), so the ’24 would be altogether chunkier and a different machine.
I seem to recall the 121 was well-reviewed (and well-liked) when new, but oddly enough, the Festiva didn’t have much of a name not too long after they first turned up. The quality was poor and they all clapped-out young, so I’m quite struck by the high-miles stories I hear from the US.
QUOTE: “The quality was poor”
Not my direct experience at all. Who told you that?
I told me!
Hire of a 5,000km one in about ’98 (paint, interior plastics, assembly, way below Mazda level): a week-long use of a cared-for 2000-odd 70K km in about ’06 (the pretty replacement on same chassis called Aspire in N/A) which felt like it had 270K on it: “don’t buy” warnings from reliable contacts in the industry (those who have to make a living from them): used reviews like the one linked: their very common smokiness on the road: and the smart disappearance of them all from the roads long before the usual lingering. As I said, that’s why I’m struck by the US tales above. I speculate that it’s possible we got them from a diff S Korean factory – “our” GM Holden Captivas and Cruzes from the old Daewoo factory have a terrible name that those badges just don’t have in other markets. Otherwise, no explanation.
https://www.drive.com.au/reviews/used-car-review-ford-festiva-19982000-20100824-13o7q/
IIRC, these developed fuel injection later in life. Added a few HP, but every bit helps. I would imagine it would be difficult to pull into your local Goodyear dealer to find tires that small.
Makes for a great runabout!!
12 inch may be rare now but back in the day I recall getting a brand new set of 4 installed for 80 bucks :^D
First new car for our family, all we could afford, the oldest boy and I would have to sit on opposite sides of the car, staggered front to back or it would noticeably lean to one side.
Overall a pretty good car, lol.
Sadly I foolishly took one glance and ignored these, for years (? decades ?) thereafter I see them as Road Roaches that owners & drivers really seem to like .
A _fun_ hair shirt, that’s desperately needed these days .
-Nate