Kustoms are boss, man!

All right, so the headline mixes expressions that were separated by a decade or so in realtime.  That’s OK, because we’ve got some real generational melding in the case of this book. Way out in coyote country, Wyoming resident Justin Kudolla has revived the old Trend Books pocket-stuffers with his Custom Cars 2009 Annual, www.trendcustomcars.com. He’s demonstrated that nowadays, there’s more to a full custom than the ‘49-’51 Ford or Mercury when it comes to raw material.

See here. Aside from the starting point, a 1953 Buick, this scraper is trad. Supremely trad. A 1955 Oldsmobile bumper that frames a 1953 grille and parking lamp assembly (!) has been muscled into place here. Out back are shorty fins with Packard taillamps. The side spears are stock, even if the scallops aren’t.

Um, okay. We confess that we’ve never seen the slam treatment on a Colonnade-era El Camino, especially not so extreme that the windshield becomes a coin slot. It’s still too radical to simply qualify as a lowrider.

Ye gads. All we can say is, it looks even worse from the front. Reminds me, at least, of that old saying from curling: “Sweep, man, sweep!”