The presidential Lancia Flaminia “335” convertible limousine has been the official car of the president of the Italian Republic since 1961. It doesn’t get out often, but when it does… — In Italy, June the 2nd is the National Day of the Republic, a public holiday commemorating the day Italians abolished the monarchy by popular referendum in 1946. As per tradition, the country’s president (not to be confused with the prime minister) leads a military parade through the center of Rome…

Although minivans only became popular in the 1980s, there are many earlier designs that can legitimately claim to have pioneered the genre: perhaps none more than the Fiat 600 Multipla from 1956. — The ongoing success of sport-utility vehicles and so-called “crossover” vehicles has seemingly relegated the once-popular minivan to the fringes of the automobile market. Although mainstream success began in the 1980s with the Dodge Caravan/Plymouth Voyager in the USA and the French Renault Espace in Europe, plenty of earlier designs can…

The little story of how a humble French family car sparked a lifelong appreciation for automobile design. — “to make something have a strong and permanent influence on someone or something.” That’s how the Macmillan Dictionary defines “imprint,” and it most certainly was the last thing on my Dad’s mind when he purchased his new diesel Citroën hatchback sometime in 1985. What is a BX? Presented with great fanfare in September of…

Many enthusiasts know the Fiat X1/9's moniker originated as the car’s internal project code. However, few know how and why that code came to be, until now… — Italian automaker Fiat never quite managed to crack the US market with its mainstream offerings, whose sales never met the company’s ambitions. Sports cars were another matter, though: American enthusiasts bought enough 124 Spiders to keep the model around for years beyond its sell-by date and took nearly 60% of…

The more someone studies Alfa Romeo’s history, the more apparent it becomes that the company’s engineers have tackled almost every vehicle type imaginable over the years, including a promising small off-roader that you’ve probably never seen… — The year 1985 marked the 75th anniversary of Alfa Romeo’s foundation, but unfortunately, also the substantial failure of the turnaround plan devised by the company’s management at the end of the previous decade, which included the joint venture with Nissan that produced the unloved Arna hatchback.

With a production run spanning almost two decades, during which nearly 200.000 units were made, the 124 Spider is a beloved Fiat classic that enjoys a strong following on both sides of the Atlantic. Yet few people know that the timeless lines of this most Italian of automobiles were actually penned by an American for a Corvette. — Transatlantic Coincidences Our story began in the spring of 1963, when the legendary GM design supremo Bill Mitchell sent a brand new Corvette Sting Ray to Pininfarina, with orders to turn it into a show prototype in time for the Paris motor show in the fall of the same year.

Much like meeting a person you once idolized, getting to drive your dream car carries the risk of a crushing disappointment. Not this time, though…. — The year was 2008. The world was rapidly descending into financial meltdown, but that had yet to directly affect me (it soon would, though!). I was a car-crazed young designer working in Fiat’s design center and going through a distinctly anglophilic (don’t ask) phase: I owned a dark green Triumph Spitfire and dreamed of…

Mention of the name Lancia conjures in most enthusiasts’ minds the images of awesome rally cars storming to victory, and rightfully so. But there’s much more to Lancia’s history, including a daring fastback sedan and glamorous coupé that few people bought in the period and hardly anyone remembers: the Gamma. — A brave new era Work on the Gamma began shortly after Fiat’s takeover of an ailing Lancia in late 1969. The firm needed new models quickly, and precedence was given to the smaller Beta, which came out in 1972 and was intended as Lancia’s volume seller for the Seventies.

During the heyday of the Italian automobile design industry in the late 1960s and early 70s, the creation of outlandish one-off prototypes to wow the crowds visiting motor shows like Turin, Geneva, or Paris, was an integral part of these firms’ business. And none did it better than Bertone… — Rolling advertisement As commissions from large automakers were the lifeblood of firms like Bertone and Pininfarina, show cars served as rolling advertisements encapsulating the best of the company’s creativity and technical expertise: three-dimensional manifestos of the firm’s vision for the future of automobile design.