We all know the form - if you have money, the last thing you should do is shout it from the rooftops. By being discreet about your vast personal wealth, you'll not only keep your friends but you'll also avoid incurring the wrath of the local peasantry and finding your Bentley on bricks after leaving it on the street for ten minutes. Public displays of wealth are vulgar -- especially when you're not actually rich -- and to prove it, we've compiled a list of the ten worst lapses in taste, common sense and decency in the automotive world.
1. Paint Job
If you must drive an expensive car, make sure it's painted a sober colour (unless it's a Lamborghini, they're allowed to be lime green or bright orange). There is nothing more likely to make you the object of scorn than a retina-burning paint finish on a flash car. Jordan has a pink Bugatti Veyron, proving once and for all that you just can't buy class. If you want to look like Jordan, by all means buy a brightly coloured supercar... and then creosote your face.
2. Big Wheels
For the life of us, we just don't get big wheels. Okay, very small wheels make a car look odd but, no matter what you drive, enormous wheels don't make your car more desirable -- fact. If car-makers thought that 22-inch rims were really necessary, they'd have fitted them in the first place. By bolting on big wheels, you only actually manage to accomplish three things - ruin your 0-62mph time, knacker your car's ride, and lose your dignity. Footballer Stephen Ireland has probably lost some dignity in this Range Rover with pink rims - either that, or he lost a bet.
3. Spinners
We don't know who invented spinners, but we are sure of one thing - whoever it was must have been an almighty prat. Wheels that look like they're moving when they're not? Brilliant. How empty has your life got to be to think that they're a good idea? You're better off saving up your money and getting a penis extension, thus negating the need for spinners in the first place.
4. Cadillac Escalade
The Escalade is absolute rubbish. It's too big, too thirsty and handles like a dustbin lorry. The only reason why you'd buy one is to look like a rapper or a drug-dealer. But you're neither a rapper nor a drug-dealer. You're a 37-year-old accountant from Guildford and you live with your mother.
5. Chrome
Chrome is manna for the nouveau-riche. A host of celebrities have had their cars covered in the stuff from Theo Paphitis to Jermaine Pennant. In Pennant's case, this could be a bad move -- given his, ahem, dubious driving past, it could be a good idea to keep a low profile on the road. Indeed, there's nothing more conspicuous -- or indeed tragic -- than a chrome Aston Martin wrapped around a tree.
6. Personalised Registration Plates
Unless your name actually is TY56 RGA, there is absolutely no excuse for having a personalised registration plate. If it's an expensive plate (TIM 1, for example), people will think you're a flash git, and if it's a cheap plate (with a heavily disguised name and a surfeit of irrelevant numbers), people will squint so hard to try and read it that they'll rear-end you at the lights. And then punch you in the face.
7. Under car lighting
As we all know, cats like to sleep underneath cars. Under-car lighting could therefore be seen as a thoughtful addition to any cat-fancier's vehicle. However, it is more than likely that the owner of a car with under-car lighting is oblivious to feline needs and simply thinks the lights make him look 'gangsta'. They don't -- they make him look like a 'tossa.'
8. Massive sound system
Have you ever noticed how the people who play really loud tunes in their car invariably have an awful taste in music? You never hear a car driving past with Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition blaring out the window. If you're the type of person who advertises their top-of-the-line sound system by driving around with the passenger window down, we have three words for you: Pack...it...in.
9. Big exhaust
A performance exhaust system performs a necessary task on powerful high-end cars by allowing the engine to reach its maximum potential. A performance exhaust system on an N-registered Renault Clio does not do this. A bean can exhaust performs exactly the same function as a 'Kick Me' sign, and rightly so.
10. Crystals
All that glitters is definitely not gold. If you drive around in a crystal-covered car, what you're saying is, "Yes, my husband earned his millions robbing the local HSBC and, yes, he did pay for my new expensive breasts." Not a good look.
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