I agree, the Forte arguably has the best exterior styling of the vehicles in its class. With the revisions to the interior, I would also argue that it boasts one of the best looking interiors as well. To me, only the new Mazda 3 has an interior that is on par or even slightly better.
The story behind the Forte's exterior styling is an interesting one. There was a video made by Kia on the internet floating around during the Forte's launch date. It described how they conducted focus group studies with the public to assess how favourable the styling was being perceived compared to the Civic, Corolla, and Ford Focus (I don't believe that they included the Mazda 3 in that group, although since then the Mazda 3 has new styling which many critics do not feel is an improvement over the last gen). Initially the studies were done with a debadged Forte, meaning there were no Kia symbols on the car. In all the studies, the public rated the Forte as having the most attractive styling. Kia then decided to do the studies with Forte badged with all the Kia emblems (remember, until the Soul and Forte were launched, Kia vehicles were not really perceived by the consumers as stylish vehicles). Even with the Kia badges, the Forte was still rated as the most attractive.
The story behind the Forte's exterior styling is an interesting one. There was a video made by Kia on the internet floating around during the Forte's launch date. It described how they conducted focus group studies with the public to assess how favourable the styling was being perceived compared to the Civic, Corolla, and Ford Focus (I don't believe that they included the Mazda 3 in that group, although since then the Mazda 3 has new styling which many critics do not feel is an improvement over the last gen). Initially the studies were done with a debadged Forte, meaning there were no Kia symbols on the car. In all the studies, the public rated the Forte as having the most attractive styling. Kia then decided to do the studies with Forte badged with all the Kia emblems (remember, until the Soul and Forte were launched, Kia vehicles were not really perceived by the consumers as stylish vehicles). Even with the Kia badges, the Forte was still rated as the most attractive.
