The Pontiac Aztek has become a bit of a running joke in automotive circles for its admittedly awkward design. The vehicle’s tall, upright stance and busy, over-the-top styling have made the Tom Peters-designed crossover the butt of many jokes over the years, but it turns out the Aztek can be made to look pretty cool with some slight modifications.
Talented digital rendering artist Abimelec Arellano recently applied his design expertise to the Pontiac Aztek and managed to improve the look of it massively. Inspired by the original Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, Arellano gave the mid-size family crossover widened fender flares, ‘Snowflake’ -style Trans Am wheels and, most importantly, a golden ‘Screaming Chicken’ hood decal.
Arellano’s rendering also forgoes the grey plastic cladding that lines the lower section of the Aztek’s front and rear fascias and rocker panels in favor of body color elements. This also helps improve the look of the Aztek, with the plastic cladding on the real Aztek giving the crossover a cheap, almost unfinished appearance. Completing the package are a pair of sporty-looking dual chrome exhaust tips, a rear spoiler and a roof-mounted utility bar.
We never thought we’d say it, but this Pontiac Aztek looks genuinely good! We’d love to see a build like this show up at SEMA one day in the future, but we get the feeling tuning companies would rather not spend their time working on one of the most universally detested GM vehicles of the modern era.
A Bloomberg article published shortly after the Aztek’s release in 2000 quoted a Pontiac dealership manager as saying his customers “either love or hate” the Aztek’s aggressive styling. We imagine opinions on this rendering will be similarly split, but we think most will at least appreciate the talent it takes to improve the controversial crossover’s weird looks even a little.
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Comments
I bet if GM made something like the revised Aztek shown now with a turbo four with fat tires it might have a cult following.
I like it
And if the original Aztec had been a Honda back in 2001 it would have been hailed as a breakthrough in design.
Amen to that Bryan. I was selling Buick, Cadillac, GMC and Honda back then. The very first edition of the Aztek with all the ugly black plastic was bad. When they made some changes and put more “colored” plastic, it actually looked batter. But you are totally correct. If that had been a Honda or Toyota, it would have sold and the press would have been saying how cool it was. Can you say Element and Ridgeline? Both totally ugly.
Aztek. With a “k.”
Damned Autocorrect.
It is the same vehicle as the Buick Rendevous. Nobody cussed out that one.
It’s not the same vehicle. It’s built on the same platform. Big difference. They look nothing alike.
I would argue they look quite a bit alike, but yes, the Buick is much less bad.
This would be great to elude the DEA away from your Los Polos Hernados chicken trucks.
Lutz arrived at GM and was not impressed with the original.
He was shown at SEMA looking at a restyled Aztek asking the designers why can’t we do that?
GM at the time totally lost their way with Pontiac and really had no clue what to do with them. By the time Lutz arrived he had little time and no money to really fix them. He tried with Holden but it was too late by the bail out.
Just as well as GM still can’t fix Cadillac so I expect Pontiac would not have faired any better.
I always liked the Aztek, even with the weird gray body panels. The concept they were going for in a crossover I thought was ahead of it’s time. It would’ve been better with all wheel drive and maybe a little less curb weight, but those should’ve been things they worked out in later models. That saying, is a lot of what ifs and pipe dreams, Arellano’s design is a very cool take on the Aztek, if the first model had come out with this style it might have sold much better, and had the chance to be the vehicle it could have been.
There was a design excercise at SEMA back when they were still being sold. As I remember it was lowered painted steel grey with much the same body cladding and a great set of wheels to enhance the look. I WANTED ONE! Will look for the pictures I took of it and compare them to the ones above.
It had a much smoother nose cap and they removed many of the hard edges. It did look nice to me and I hated this vehicle.
If I remember correctly, the Aztec reached the market a short time before the Rendevous planned release date. The Aztec was received so poorly, the Rendevous was pulled back to alow a redesign! I never saw what it would have looked like, but you can bet there was a resemblance to the rad looking Pontiac. The Buick looked OK for an presumed rush job.
You may be thinking of the Regal. Lutz saw the Grand Prix and Regal for 2004 and had a new nose for the GP done and a whole new body for the Regal.
I never saw the Regal but the GTP had a Aztek like nose and scoops. It was not good.
The Regal lost over a year.
The Rendezvous as I recall went off as planned and did ok for GM.
Time was good to this car’s proportions. It kind of preempted the crossover look.
For sure it was ahead of it’s time. Unfortunately the media and general public repeated over and over that it was the ugliest thing ever.
First, I think that thing looks totally cool. Second, was the Aztek just a little ahead of it’s time? It was well packaged and kind of started the craze we see today, but I think all the black (then turned to chalky gray) plastic just killed it for me. I really liked the later version when they painted more of the body to match. I recall the yellow one that I really liked and sort of wanted.
I think if Pontiac has eliminated those upper fender lights (turn signals?) and those humungous “air scoops” at the front edge of the hood, above the grille, and made it full sheet metal, and maybe shrunk down the side glass behind the rear doors, it would have been a lot more acceptable looking – not an outstanding design, but at least acceptable. Certainly better than the bland design of the Buick Rendevous.
What you described doing to fix the Aztek sounds a lot like the Rendezvous. Maybe removing all those design features just makes it bland.