Nissan Pao

The Nissan Pao is a retro styled three door hatchback manufactured by Nissan for model years 1989–1991, and originally marketed solely in Japan at their Nissan Cherry Stores. First announced at the Tokyo Motor Show in October 1987, the Pao was available with or without a textile sun roof and was originally marketed without Nissan branding, by reservation only from January 15 through April 14, 1989. Orders were delivered on a first come, first served basis. With 51,657 applications for the vehicle, it sold out in 3 months. The UK's GTR Registry website provided updated production figures in 2022 with per colour code quantities, and a total production quantity of 31,352. Because of its origins at Pike Factory, Nissan's special project group, the Pao – along with the Nissan Figaro, Be 1 and S Cargo – are known as Nissan's "Pike cars". The promotional campaign for the car included a surreal and futuristic animated video featuring members of the Pike Factory team. In 2011, noted design critic Phil Patton, writing for the New York Times, called the Pike cars "the height of postmodernism"

Part of Nissan's "Pike" series, it was designed as a retro fashionable city car in the mould of the Be 1. It included external door hinges like the original 1960s Austin Mini which had become fashionable in Japan, 'flap up' windows like those of a Citroën 2CV, and a split rear tailgate of the first British hatchback car the Austin A40 Farina Countryman. The Be 1, Pao, Figaro, and S Cargo were attempts to create cars with designs as desirable as those of Panasonic, Sony, and other personal electronics products. The Pao's side strakes evoked the construction of earlier Woodie car body styles. The design of the Pao is usually credited to Naoki Sakai who also worked for Olympus, where he brought back "the brushed aluminium look". Sakai also helped design Toyota's later WiLL cars, which echo the Pike series. The canvas top sun roof version also had the option of a five speed manual (PK10GFW) or three speed automatic (PK10GAW). The car uses unleaded regular gas with a tank capacity. In the city, it could deliver up to 5.4 L/100 km (44 mpg‑US) for the manual and 6.9 L/100 km (34 mpg‑US), and on the highway up to 3.4 L/100 km (69 mpg‑US) for the manual and 4.3 L/100 km (55 mpg‑US) for the automatic. It featured standard equipment including power steering, intermittent wiper, radio and tape deck, height adjustable driver's seat, tensionless ELR seat belts (front seats), and an electromagnetic glass hatch release. Optional extras were a clock, tonneau cover/parcel shelf, drinks holder, dash tray, under dash tray, leather steering wheel grips, combination stereo/cd deck, rear speakers, fog lamp and front guard bar, lightweight aluminium wheels, and a ‘serviceable car kit’ comprising polish, brush, wash mitt, silver gloves, chamois and paperwork wallet, supplied in a courier style bag made of pao seat fabric.