Trends in the motoring world come and go much like those in the fashion world. What seemed cool 20 years ago can sometimes seem stupid or tacky in the modern day. Think about the speaker and screen setups in the back of underpowered economy cars, spinners on big luxury SUVs and hideous sexual imagery shameless plastered over an otherwise non-descript Lancer. We enthusiasts openly detest such gharish displays because it’s totally laughable, yet despite this, not all trends die in flames. Some still tickle your brain, no matter how hard you try to surpress the feeling. Widebody kits are just that. One of the first to grab my attenion was the kit Liberty Walk fitted to the R35 GT-R – huge arch extensions “bolted” to the body, bigger bumpers, front and rear aero below said bumpers and a rear wing that could’ve come off a race car. What was initially viewed as a flash in the pan has rooted itself in modern car culture, hence why I’m talking about this car today.
When the GT-R badge returned to Nissan’s stable in 2007, it was fitted to a bespoke car without any Skyline underpinnings. I still remember the fuss it kicked up and the huge amount of publicity it received. Nissan humiliated Porsche on their home turf and almost overnight, the sportscar game shifted. Soo good was the car that Nissan themselves have still not been able to create a successor… despite the constant teasing. Anyway Liberty Walk saw the hullabaloo unfolding and capitalised by creating a mad body kit that left the short-lived GT1 car blushing. Suddenly the whole world was enamoured by this little Japanese custom shop.
After such a meteoric rise to fame, many people began asking – what the hell is Liberty Walk? What does it mean? It’s a strange name for a tuning shop, but it’s one of those funny Japanese-English terms which supposedly champions freedom of expression and unity. Essentially, we take a walk down the streets of liberty. It’s a very philosophical approach – but it goes further than that. Their slogan “Imagine all the people living in peace” reads more like something from the mind of Aristotle (or Aristoletis as the Greeks would say), not a workshop that carves body kits out of plastic and metal. The people at Liberty Walk are artisans, much like the stone carvers of ancient Greece.
If your widebody kit wasn’t enough to capture the attention of onlookers, then you obviously fit an airbag kit so you can drop the car on the deck when you park up. For such a system to work, you need a canister of compressed air fitted in the boot to either inflate or deflate the bags themselves. Stage prescence is a key part of the Liberty Walk style and I can say for a fact that it works as a piece of automotive theatre. It’s unambigious with plenty of definition and a bunch of pizzaz.
Liberty Walk isn’t soo much stifling convention as much as its creating a new wave of thinking that’s outside the box. Supremacy is not the way because it just allows egotistical thoughts to propogate and prevail over more humble ones. The beauty of the car community is built upon freedom of expression and a willingness to share stories. And maybe dyno numbers if you’re so inclined. Regardless, Liberty Walk will still be there to support it all. Noble principles and killer cars won’t ever fall by the wayside like the cringeworthy trends of the past.
DevMacCars 