The inside of the 500 has been just as thoughtfully designed as its outside. A swage of body-coloured plastic sweeps across the centre of the dash, bordered by Bakelite-esque switch panels for the ventilation and stereo controls.
Fabrics and colours could all be from the 1950s, but the quality of construction is not; fit and finish are very good, although some switches lack the bespoke feel of, say, a Mini's. This is unsurprising; the dash layouts of a Panda and a 500 are virtually the same because they share so much mechanically and electrically.
There's no shortage of space in the front, but where the design of the original 500 gave today's engineers a bigger challenge was in making room for rear passengers. The 1957 car's roof curved towards the rear to intentionally reduce space behind the front seats, to help differentiate it from the four-seat 600. Even later 500s had rear seats that were fit only for children.
Yet today's car, which is only 3.5 metres long, was designed as a full four-seater from the off, so you sit low in the 500's back pair of chairs, on thin but dense padding, and headroom is still tight. But legroom is surprisingly good for a car this short and it's certainly more accommodating than a Mini. Beneath one of the smallest parcel shelves known to man there is a 185-litre boot.
Fiat UK has told us that the 500 will probably be around five per cent more expensive than in Italy, which will make it quite well priced against its obvious rival, the Mini.
Expect residual values to stay strong, and other ownership costs should prove competitive. Mechanically this is a Panda underneath, and that car scores reasonably well in customer satisfaction surveys.
Fuel consumption is very reasonable too; our test average of 35.8mpg is good, and even with a small 35-litre tank it gives a decent range of nearly 300 miles.
The 500 has also crash-tested very well, achieving five EuroNCAP stars.