Ford's UK production doubled from 1954 to 1958 (imagine that) and the Zodiac range had a good deal to do with that. It fitted the mood of the times; emerging from the age of austerity, approaching the age of affluence.
A cautiously optimistic car. The Ford looked less dowdy than its British rivals, the Austin Cambridge/Westminster, Morris Oxford, Standard Vanguard and Vauxhall Cresta, all of which looked nice, but never as graceful as the Zodiac.

If it was a jukebox on wheels, it was playing Cliff Richard and Lonnie Donegan rather than Elvis and Little Richard.
Even today, its rock'n'roll credentials are a little forced. While the Ford Zodiac often appears at classic-car meets being driven by a teddy boy and his polka-dotted moll, very few teds could have afforded one.
Fifty years ago, when they were first on sale, a Zodiac would set you back almost £1,000; about two years' wages for the average working man, or (say) £40,000 in today's terms.
It was a professional man's transport built for tweed rather than speed, and not really intended as wheels for those given to slashing cinema seats.