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This is a feminine car, and seems to be aimed at the female buyer in her twenties or thirties. I say that for many reasons, not least the stylish design, inside and out. The smart interior features such appealing touches as the upholstered oval detail on the doors, and circular heater controls with a circular Perspex gauge. Our Active Luxury test car also had unusually beautiful seats for a supermini, in a clever mixture of Alcantara and leather.

Meanwhile, from the outside there's the charmingly rounded body shape: personally, I love the Micra's cute face and chubby body profile - although the bum is a bit droopy from the side.

At every stage, I can't help but make comparisons with the Ford Fiesta, where the interior is cosmetically drab. The Micra is the complete opposite, with a good range of stowage compartments, particulary noteworthy in the back (where the Fiesta had no storage whatsoever), boasting a small cubby and a tall bottle-holder for rear passengers. But the Micra is the opposite of the Fiesta in more ways than one. After testing the Fiesta I reported that it seemed to be built from the upper half of a budget supermini, surgically attached to the dynamic underbelly of a vastly more expensive machine. Now I know what they did with the left-over halves: the Micra has all the interior style and comfort which the Fiesta lacks, but the driving experience is simply no match for the Fiesta's sophisticated dynamics.