Buick Riviera 1973 “Counts Kustoms”

Bill Mitchell designed the boattail Buick Riviera to channel the drama of 1930s speedster styling, scaling up a taper he had already proven on the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray. The controversial shape divided critics for three model years, and by 1973 Buick had already begun smoothing it out. This particular example later passed through Count’s Kustoms, the Las Vegas shop behind History Channel’s Counting Cars.

These Boat tail Rivera were cool from the factory but let the Boys over at Count’s Kustoms get a hold of it and they can take it over the top.. The paint work is incredible.. But the rest of the Car should make you smile too.. Very cool.. Check it out!!

GM’s design boss in the early 1970s wanted a full-size personal luxury coupe to capture the same drama he loved in 1930s speedster styling, and the result was one of the most divisive shapes Buick ever put into production. Bill Mitchell modeled the boattail Riviera’s tapered rear end after the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray he considered his masterpiece, but stretching that dramatic taper across a much larger body created a design some critics loved and others openly mocked. By 1973, Buick had already begun smoothing out the controversial tail before eventually abandoning the shape altogether. Decades later, a Las Vegas shop known for reality-TV builds got its hands on one, and took the styling somewhere Bill Mitchell never imagined.

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A Design Born From a Speedboat, Not a Sedan

Mitchell wanted the Riviera to channel the rakish “boat-tail” speedsters of the 1920s and ’30s, and he had already proven the concept worked in miniature on the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray. Scaling that same taper up onto a much larger B-body platform for the full-size Riviera changed everything about how it read visually. Mitchell himself later admitted that widening the design turned what should have looked like a speedboat into a tugboat, a rare public critique from the man who championed the shape in the first place.

Count’s Kustoms Takes On a Factory Original

By 1973, the final year of the boattail design, Buick had already toned down the controversy, giving the car a less peaked tail with integrated bumper-mounted taillights and a smoothed, rubber-trimmed rear point. Decades later, this particular ’73 Riviera passed through Count’s Kustoms, the Las Vegas custom shop run by Danny “Count” Koker and made famous on History Channel’s Counting Cars, a build that traded factory subtlety for showstopping paint and details, on top of one of Detroit’s most argued-about designs.

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