Retro resto! Bobby Mahi devoted nearly a year of his life to the thorough restoration of this Mk 1 GTI, transforming it from a purple-painted horror into a silver dream machine...

摘要

IT'S DIFFICULT TO comprehend nowadays, but there was a time when the 'cool' thing to do to a Mk 1 GTI was to slap on a body-styling kit and a set of three-spoke alloy wheels, fit a single wiper conversion, weld in Audi 80 door handles and paint it purple... In fact, there was a whole industry based around that sort of customising and the pictures from GTI International and GTI Festival in the late Eighties and early Nineties show row after row of very similarly modified Mk 1 and 2s lined up the concours area, car parks and car sales compound. It's a mixed blessing, but with many such modified cars now virtually worthless, abandoned or scrapped, a Mk 1 GTI in original standard condition has become quite a rarity.