Hottest Trunk. Wait.... What?

Many of you may be familiar with Archie's 2 Door Evo. It has graced the covers and features of magazines all over the world throughout many stages of its appearance, and inspired thousands of other builds. To best explain what it is, imagine this; If Mitsubishi ever produced a left hand drive Evo Coupe', this is what it would look like. Ask Archie about his car, though, you'll probably hear something on the lines of: "Nah.... It's just a Mirage...."

Summer of 2014 kicked off the transformation of the 2 door Evo as it appears today. It was that summer where I was hired to fill some empty trunk space.

I try to attend as many shows as possible just to see whats out there and to keep up with the latest in build styles. I really like talking to other builders and owners alike. It's a really tight knit community and I absolutely love it. During each show, I usually browse through all the award categories and try to guess as to which vehicle is going to win as I check out all the vehicles on display. 

Of course I checked out all of the trunks being shown at the show. There were some seriously involved and well though out designs on display. You can tell the builders of these trunks put some serious hours into each one. They were all very impressive.

I'm all about functional performance gains to a vehicle. After all, why go to great lengths and spend thousands on a part that just looks pretty? The engineer inside of me sees no purpose in it, but the experienced builder inside of me knows it is a very integral part of making your car famous. Every time I get hired to build a part that otherwise does not exist, I fight to make both sides of my mind (the engineer and the builder) come to a compromise. I must try to make a completely functional part with a show matching show quality appeal. I really do my best to not sacrifice one or the other, but if I do, I always sacrifice the appeal. The product must remain functional.

It is because of that mentality that both Archie and I were pretty shocked to find out my trunk design took the Hottest Trunk award at Hot Import Nights (HIN) Las Vegas a year later. 

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I was very familiar with the 2 Door Evo to begin with, so very little time was needed to get started. All I needed to know from Archie is what sort of design he was looking for. The best possible response was given as he waved his hands at the trunk space; "I want to see bars. Just do what you do and fill up all that space." That is one of the best things a builder can hear. It basically means "Do whatever."

 I pretty much had my design all worked out, so the best place to start on a build like this is to get the two main bars in followed by the rear X bracing.

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The rear lower bar came together so quickly because the design was already set in my brain. I also knew my reveal had to be just as simple and clean as the rest of the trunk. This is the simplest design I could come up with.

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I knew this design was going to be just perfect the moment the lower bar was finished. I was on a roll and in my mode so nicely that the front upper bar came together so smoothly and quick. Before I knew it, the upper was done and matched the lower.

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All that remained to complete was the coating. Once the paint work was complete, and the powder coating on the bars finished, I built a set of locking trunk stands to display at the shows. 

It just goes to show that you never know what will take the win. Something as simple as a functional custom Strut Tower System in a stripped and paint matched trunk can top a category. While none of us expected this to even place, or really gain a ton of notoriety compared to the insane amounts of modifications on the rest of the car, I can definitely say that I am extremely honored to know that my design was able to give the owner one more unique win to remember.

>>UPDATE! Check out Archie's latest feature in PASMAG HERE! Be sure to get the actual Japan Special Edition magazine before it disappears off of shelves. It's definitely a mag worth collecting!

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Do you think this design was worthy? Tell me about it in the comments below!