The evolution of the "Bunny"
12/05/2021
Until a few years ago, the roles at tuning fairs were clearly divided: Cars with lavish body cladding but without everyday practicality and road approval were the show cars; and young women with almost no clothes but with bunny ears and fluffy tails were the "bunnies" - based on the bunny mascot of the men's magazine Playboy.
Slowly, however, the boundaries between the two favorite motifs of male car fans seem to be blurring. It all started with a Japanese manufacturer of mudguard extensions, which are marketed under the name "Rocket Bunny" and are particularly popular in the Japanese scene. Dortmund-based extreme tuner Jean-Pierre Krämer showed his interpretation of a "bunny" at the Essen Motor Show this year and presented a brutal wide-body Golf 2, which he called "Thunderbunny" - the intensified form, if you like.
But it's not just in terms of names that machines seem to be increasingly replacing mannequins. While in 2014 (picture below), female models were still vying for the favor of visitors on almost every stand at the Essen Motor Show, in 2021 there were only a few "bunnies" to be found - and only one of them was actually in a bunny costume. Instead, the number of cars with a "Rocket Bunny" kit has steadily increased, culminating in Dortmund's "Thunder Bunny".
Whether you approve of this development or not is up to you to decide. For some, the girls are as much a part of tuning folklore as bass rumbling and banging exhausts. Others could well do without all three.
