Citroën C3: car review | Martin Love

Citroin's new supermini may look a bit peculiar, but its fun gadgets and French charm will soon win you over

Price: 10,795
Top speed: 117mph
0-62mph: 9.3 seconds
MPG: 61.4
CO2: 103g/km

Last year Citroin did a curious thing: they took one of their reliable if rather dull cars and stuck a lumpy plastic strip down each side that, depending on your cultural reference points, resembled either a giant bar of Dairy Milk or a rigid sofa from the 50s. They also made everything that was round square (except the wheels or course). It had square lights and bumpers, square seats and storage cubbies, square instruments and vents" even the steering wheel had corners. The designer who did this was Mark Lloyd. Putting an Englishman in charge of one of France's most historic brands was clearly risky, but Mark's outri(C) design wasn't an act of Anglo-French industrial sabotage, but a courageous attempt to stand out in the crowd. As he said at the time: "Almost every car company knows how to make reliable, quality cars with great technological content and even great looking cars. Everybody has the capacity to make a great car. So Given that's the case then how do you differentiate? This is our answer. Some people won't like it, but a lot will love it." And he was right - thousands of people loved it and the C4 Cactus became an overnight bestseller.