BMW’s a sneaky little bugger of a company. It’s made so many cool and unusual cars, various prototypes formed in the beautiful minds of mad geniuses, but showed almost none of them to the public. There’s a vault somewhere in the underbelly of BMW Group’s Classic center that has a bunch of them, and the Bavarians have been slowing bringing some of them out. Who knows how many more there are. The latest secret car to crawl out of BMW’s cave is a five-door version of the E36 3 Series Compact. And this Instagram video from Retro Garage Official is the first time it’s being seen by the public.
The 3 Series Compact was popular in the ’90s, as it offered the same handling and fun as a normal E36, just in a smaller package that was easier to park and navigate cramped city streets. It also came with small, fuel-efficient engines, making it the economical Bimmer. However, it only ever came with three doors — two passenger doors and a rear hatch. The rear hatch made it practical as a grocery-getter, but its lack of rear doors made it less so for anyone with small humans living at home.
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So BMW decided to toy around with the formula a bit, at some point, and came up with the five-door model you see here. It was originally a Boston Green Metallic 3 Series Compact, but BMW took it and turned it into a red five-door car. It looks better than the three-door car, with a less awkward, frumpy rear end. The rear deck is still oddly short, but it looks more cohesive with the added body length and rear doors.
This specific car isn’t a very interesting spec. In fact, as a BMW 316i, it’s in what might be the least exciting spec an E36 3 Series could come in. In addition to the small four-cylinder engine, it also has a four-speed automatic transmission, exacerbating its sluggishness. Its tan seats are cloth, but heated, and it has wind-up windows. So it’s a pretty lame spec, but it’s an cool, if a bit strange looking car that no one ever knew about .
