Volvo Amazons: solid as a rock

By Andrew Roberts

| 29 Jul 2025

Classic & Sports Car – Volvo Amazons: solid as a rock

The Swedish language features the term vackrare vardagsvara, which translates roughly as the demand for ‘beauty in everyday items’.

For a motor manufacturer, the balance between practicality and aesthetics can be challenging to achieve, but the Volvo Amazon is one of the most successful examples.

Our windswept setting could be a backdrop for a Bergman film, or perhaps one of those Nordic Noir crime dramas in which the inspector downs aquavit before piecing together the evidence, but this car is at home in virtually any setting – even several decades after its launch.

The Volvo Amazon 122S corners safely, with little body roll

Volvos are now street furniture in the UK, so it takes a considerable leap of imagination to consider that, when the Amazon starred at the 1956 Earls Court Motor Show, there were thousands of motorists who had never heard of the marque.

Official sales commenced two years later, and the 120 range became the first Swedish car to be seen in suburbia because Saabs were not available here until 1960.

One early tester was racing driver Mike Hawthorn, who reviewed a 122S for the Sunday Express and found its finish to be ‘as splendid as the Midnight Sun’ and the suspension ‘not too hard for rich and fragile aunts’.

To the uninitiated, the Volvo Amazon line-up is almost as confusing as that of the Citroën DS range, with numbers such as 121 (a basic four-door), 131 (the equivalent two-door) and 222 (a more powerful estate) being confusing, if logical.

Aficionados can recognise instantly a particular member of the line-up via the grille pattern or hubcaps, but for now we will merely say that the original model was called the 120, which was announced on 1 August 1956.

The strip speedometer was a constant in the Volvo Amazon’s roomy cabin

Volvo had planned to badge its new car as the Amazon, but, following complaints from the German motorcycle maker Kreidler, this was used only on the home market.

The 1.6-litre engine and three-speed transmission were familiar from the PV444, but the four-door coachwork was a sensation.

One major inspiration for designer Jan Wilsgaard was a Kaiser that he had seen at Gothenburg harbour, although the fledgling stylist was obliged to undertake the development of the new model in his own free time because management forbade work on such a frivolous-looking car during office hours.

MD Assar Gabrielsson was of the opinion that a Volvo should look discreet, and he bemoaned Wilsgaard’s creation as having “too much of the pin-up about it”.

And the 120 was indeed the Anita Ekberg of the car world to a Swedish buyer of the late ’50s.

The Volvo Amazon 122S has comfortable rear seats

Its quasi-Detroit lines were no surprise, because American cars were a familiar sight on Swedish roads at that time and the PV444 resembled a 1941 Ford.

The Amazon appeared contemporary, though – it was the first Volvo with a duotone paint finish – without being too flamboyant for a Stockholm assistant bank manager.

The 120-series did not immediately replace the PV range, which remained in production until 1965 and was gradually phased out as the Amazon line-up expanded.

Deliveries commenced in March 1957, followed by the introduction of the twin-carburettor S the following year and, to the relief of Volvo’s customers, the option of a four-speed gearbox.

In 1961, the 1.6-litre engine was phased out in favour of the 1778cc B18, which was a slightly modified version of the P1800’s unit.

The Volvo Amazon 122S has a twin-carburettor engine, based on the P1800’s unit

The oldest of our trio is a Volvo 122S B18, which combined the larger engine with twin SUs and a rather dashing appearance.

To a 1963 driver, the Volvo’s transatlantic lines would not have been exceptional in themselves (its near contemporary, the Humber Hawk, followed Detroit styling tropes), but what remains notable is how Wilsgaard never fell into the trap of American pastiche such as the Vauxhall Victor F-type or the Ford Consul Classic.

The Amazon’s lines were intended to appeal to US and Canadian buyers, although not in a way that would render the bodywork as hopelessly old hat within just a few years.

From today’s perspective, every aspect of the Volvo 122S is well balanced, from the Chrysler 300-style grille to the vestigial tailfins.

It is certainly an old car, but it’s never a dated one.

The Volvo Amazon 221 is a versatile and rugged estate

The same air of practical refinement pervades a cabin that is businesslike but not spartan.

A Volvo 122S with the optional Laycock de Normanville overdrive cost £1399, so it competed against the likes of the Wolseley 6/110, where a buyer might expect walnut veneers and hide trim.

Inside, the 122S has well-fitted rubber mats, three-point static front seatbelts (standard on all Volvos since 1959), a universally jointed steering column and a heater with a volcanic output.

This last item proved to be of particular use on a spring day when sleet threatened.

The front seat backrests have a choice of three positions, and most drivers opt for ‘commanding’; a Volvo Amazon is that type of car.

‘To Volvo, an estate car could feel equally at home in a farmyard as in the directors’ car park’

A row of identical switches provides entertaining confusion for the novice – I attempt to operate the heater fan with the cigarette lighter.

To an Ian Hendry-style young executive, the 122S, with its thick pillars framing the windscreen and the long gearlever sprouting directly from the toe-board, may have looked staid compared with one of those new Rover 2000s, yet many saw the Amazon as a car of quiet distinction.

After all, a Volvo had won the 1963 European Rally Championship, and it was ideal for reaching a breakfast meeting at Farthing Corner on the M2 in record time.

Hawthorn found the gearchange to be ‘as stiff as the noblest upper lip’, but the stout lever is delightfully precise.

Once on the move, the steering feels quite light for a substantial motor car, and while the 122S is heavy at low speeds, it is a fine touring vehicle.

The Volvo Amazon 221 has lots of boot space, even without folding the rear seats

The orange needle careers across the strip speedometer with aplomb.

One bonus not found on earlier models is front disc brakes, but the pedals aren’t entirely suited to size-12 brogues.

American-market 120s were sold as ‘the distinguished car for distinguished people’, with pictures of well-heeled types beaming at their Volvo while playing golf or merely looking disdainfully at any Chevrolet Corvair owner in their midst.

The last half of that claim may be pure Madison Avenue snobbery, but the first part is a fair statement: a 1963-vintage British motorist would have regarded the Volvo 122S as affordably exotic.

Even after the inflation of the price by Purchase Tax and import duties, the Volvo was cheaper than a Mercedes-Benz 190C, and it conveyed a sense of panache to a go-ahead accountant or progressive-minded solicitor.

The Volvo Amazon 221’s numberplate hinges to reveal the fuel filler

For the driver who found the Triumph 2000 too youthful, the Humber Hawk too municipal and the Vauxhall Cresta PB a bit too ‘wideboy made good’, alternatives to the Amazon were the slower but equally well-built Peugeot 404 or maybe the Gaz-Volga M21, a few of which found homes in the UK.

Volvo ownership was less likely to have the neighbours thinking you were a KGB sleeper agent, however.

A two-door Amazon was added in 1961, and the following year the range was expanded with a station wagon, the car that Britain’s antique dealers had desired for so long.

Before 1962, the standard Volvo estate was the PV445 Duett, which for the previous nine years had established a niche as Sweden’s national workhorse.

The firm intended the five-door Amazon to appeal to a rather different type of buyer, however.

‘The Volvo Amazon’s lines followed the Detroit tropes, but never ventured into an American pastiche’

The development costs were considerable – the roof, rear doors, wings and tailgate were unique to the 221 – and the new model was aimed at the upper middle classes.

Both cars remained in production until 1969, when they were replaced by the Volvo 145.

When looking at our redoubtable 1966 model, it is hard to envisage how any Volvo could cause controversy.

In 1965 this proved to be the case, though, when Hampshire Constabulary ordered an Amazon estate – the first foreign car bought by the British police.

‘Our’ smart blue example was originally registered to a British serviceman in West Germany, probably gaining its UK plate in 1967.

The 115bhp Volvo Amazon 123GT was a post-war Q-car

The badging states that this car is a 121: it was officially known as the 221, but the semantics are of less interest than the detailing.

The device behind the driver’s headrest (itself rare in a car of this era) is not a TV aerial but a coathanger.

Plus, the front seats have lumbar-support adjusters, the rear numberplate is hinged à la early Mini and the rear overriders double as steps.

Concerning performance, the Volvo 221’s single-carb engine is not quite as lively as the 122S, but it would still have caused MG 1100 owners to gawp in amazement at traffic lights.

More remarkable still are the road manners, which would have been a revelation to any motorist used to the Ford Zodiac MkIV Farnham or Humber Super Snipe station wagon.

The Volvo Amazon 123GT’s rev counter sprouts from the dashboard

To Volvo, an estate car could be practical without handling like the RMS Queen Mary and be equally at home in a farmyard as in the directors’ car park.

Despite the artificial raising of the Amazon’s UK price, it was still competitive.

At £1420 in 1968, it cost £200 more than the equivalent Ford Corsair V4 but undercut a Triumph 2000 estate – one of its closest rivals – by £120.

The final member of our group is the Volvo 123GT, a car that belongs to a distinct category of 1960s sports saloons.

It made its debut in 1967, when not a few drivers were prone to decorating their Mk2 Ford Cortinas with leopardskin steering-wheel covers and ‘performance’ rims.

They would then don imitation-leather driving gloves for a trip to Victor Value, happily immune to colleagues laughing at the idea of how a highly decorated 1300 De Luxe could transform its owner into the next Jackie Stewart.

The Volvo Amazon 123GT got twin SUs for its 2-litre engine

That Cortina owner would have considered the idea of an Amazon sports saloon as bizarre as Tommy Steele joining Cream.

Yet to those who valued discretion and quality – and had little time for check-pattern wipers and other such frivolities – the 123GT was the ideal Volvo.

Under the stout bonnet lurked the P1800’s 1.8-litre engine, and overdrive was standard.

There were various racy accoutrements – competition dampers, a three-spoke steering wheel, auxiliary lights and a Smiths tachometer – although these were all very much in keeping with the 120’s practical philosophy.

The result is an innocuous-looking two-door saloon (there was no four-door) that appeared as if it hailed from the 1950s and drove like a car that was two decades younger.

‘Our’ 1968 example has the 2-litre B20 engine as fitted to the 1800S, plus optional hide trim and wider wheels with banded steel rims.

This Volvo Amazon 123GT’s Wipac lights emphasise its rallying image

The Volvo 123GT ranks alongside the MG Magnette ZA and the Borgward Isabella as a great post-war Q-car that can accelerate past startled-looking Vauxhall Astra owners with considerable élan.

‘Drive it like you hate it,’ suggested Volvo’s advertisements, but that would be impossible in a car of such a good nature.

Boy-racers may enjoy dramatic cornering, although the 123GT just modestly leans over and performs the manoeuvre with well-bred understatement and restraint.

The main noise is from the vast exhaust, which looks as if it belongs on a modern hot hatchback. Yet the raison d’être of this splendid motor car is that efficiency was not incompatible with sheer fun.

Production of the Amazon finally ceased on 3 July 1970, by which time the Volvo name was established firmly across the globe.

Assar Gabrielsson may have believed that it was better for “a car to be ugly rather than too beautiful”, but the 120 series continues to prove the fallacy of that argument: vackrare vardagsvara indeed.

Or, in the inimitable words of Mike Hawthorn, the Volvo Amazon is ‘a sensation of a car’.

Images: Tony Baker

Thanks to: owners Kevin Diamond (122S), Mark Whitton (221), Gillian Whitton (123GT); Adrian Fell, AJF Motor Engineers; everyone at Westcott Venture Park; Volvo Enthusiasts’ Club

This was first in our July 2016 magazine; all information was correct at the date of original publication

Jans Wilsgaard: sculpture student turned car stylist

The curvy Volvo Amazon transitioned into the boxy 144 at the hands of Jans Wilsgaard

It took time for Jans Wilsgaard to convince the old guard at Volvo about his fresh approach to car styling.

He was studying sculpture at art school when, in 1950, he decided to jump ship – with a year of the course remaining – and take a job with the car maker.

His fledgling in-house department was often in competition with external design houses.

In fact, the youngster’s first three proposals – the Philip (1950), the PV179 (1952) and the 55 a year later – did not make it to fruition.

Things changed with the universally acclaimed Amazon, though, even if his then MD thought it was a bit racy for the sober marque.

Wilsgaard set the Volvo template for the 1970s and ’80s, with the boxy but elegant and durable 144, 164 and 200 series, plus the 700 range.

The final model that Wilsgaard had a hand in was the 850.

It marked the end of the Cubist line before Peter Horbury smoothed off the edges, ruffling the feathers of Volvo’s conservative customers rather than the firm’s top brass.

Factfiles

Volvo Amazon 122S

Sold/number built 1958-’67/234,209 (all four-doors)
Construction steel monocoque
Engine all-iron, ohv 1778cc ‘four’, twin SU carburettors
Max power 90bhp @ 5000rpm
Max torque 105lb ft @ 3500rpm
Transmission four-speed manual, RWD
Suspension: front independent, by double wishbones, anti-roll bar rear live axle, torque arms, Panhard rod; coil springs, telescopic dampers f/r
Steering cam and roller
Brakes discs front, drums rear, with servo from ’64
Length 14ft 7in (4450mm)
Width 5ft 4in (1626mm)
Height 4ft 11in (1499mm)
Wheelbase 8ft 6½in (2604mm)
Weight 2403lb (1090kg)
0-60mph 14.4 secs
Top speed 94mph
Mpg 24-30
Price new £1399