The most obvious part of this facelift is clearly where we should begin its description, slapped across the front of the car about as conspicuously as Carla Bruni’s latest pair of anti-paparazzi sunglasses.
The 3’s new chrome grille seems less a styling tweak and more an attempt to reverse dwindling visibility.
Having originally offered a more refined, understated aspect than the ‘single-frame’ stare of an Audi A1 six years ago, the 3 has now swung to the opposite end of the can’t-beat-’em-join-’em scale and set out to upstage its German rival with a grille of even bigger, bolder, pointier and shinier presence.
The extensions at its edges, reaching out to connect the headlights and foglights, are ‘double wings’, say DS’s stylists – there for added impact. There’s certainly plenty of that.
But however impactful, the car’s new look is at odds with the effortless pizzazz of what went before it and we’re not convinced that owners of the outgoing car will approve. For what it’s worth, more of our testers reacted against that grille than were in favour of it, which may be bad news for DS because this grille will be introduced to other models later on.
