Contents

Introduction

Ford Model T 1908

GN Cyclecar 1910
Austin Seven c.1922–28
Bugatti Type 35B 1924
Salmson San Sebastian 1925
Tracta 1927
Dymaxion 1933
Citroën Traction Avant 1934
Bugatti Type 57 Atlantic 1936
Tatra T87 1936
BMW 328 1937
Alfa Romeo 8c 2900B Le Mans special 1938
Cisitalia Berlinetta 1946
Original Volkswagen 1946
Ferrari 125S 1947
Land Rover 1948
Piaggio Ape 1948
Citroën 2CV 1949
Buick LeSabre concept car 1951
Bertone BAT 1953
Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint 1954
Fiat Turbina 1954
Panhard Dyna 1954
Citroën DS 1955
Fiat 600 1955
Austin FX4 taxi 1956
Lotus Elite 1957
Trabant 1957
Mini 1959
Saab 96 1960
Citroën Ami 1961
Jaguar E-Type 1961
Lamborghini 350 GTV 1963
Ford GT40 1964
Chevrolet Corvair 1965
Lamborghini Miura 1965
NSU Ro 80 1967
Bertone Carabo show car 1968
Range Rover 1970
Alfasud 1971
Austin Allegro 1973
VW Golf 1974
BMW 3 Series 1975
Lancia Megagamma 1978
Mazda RX7 1978
Audi 100 1983
Toyota Prius 1997
Fiat Multipla 1998
Nissan Cube 1998
Smart 1998

Index
Picture Credits
Credits
FIFTY
CARS
The car, as we know it, may well be facing oblivion in a world trying to
convince itself that it is committed to reducing carbon-dioxide emissions,
and rescuing its cities from the endless sprawl that comes from suburbs
at densities that can survive only with car commuting. Yet for a century,
the car has been a remarkably powerful catalyst for change, whose
influence can be compared easily with that of the aeroplane or microchip.
From its earliest incarnations on, the car has demanded consideration
– and indeed attracted veneration – on multiple levels: as sculptural
object, as the product of avant-garde industrialism, and as a remarkable
piece of engineering. Thus early cars borrowed their formal expression
from their nearest relatives, the horse-drawn carriages; Ford famously
modelled the first car production line on the techniques of the Chicago
meatpackers; and the first steps towards self-propelled mechanical
motion can be found in the eighteenth century. Equally, the car has been
used as a measure of national prestige – hence the successive attempts
of Iran, Malaysia, Turkey, Brazil, India and China to establish themselves
as global carmakers.
At the Design Museum we believe it is important to take these wider
contexts into account, and not simply to focus on formal issues, no matter
how seductive the stylistics can be. Our collection includes, for example,
a wooden prototype of the car designed by Le Corbusier in 1928 and a
Nissan S Cargo from 1987, one of the first examples of a car made by a
mainstream carmaker that acknowledges the playful, emotional aspects
of car design.
Deyan Sudjic, Director, Design Museum
The Jaguar E-type – a British icon in car design.
FORD MODEL T
1908
The Model T has two stories. The obvious one is that it was a sound,
utilitarian device that motorized the United States. It was free from many
of the quirks of other early cars, was thoughtfully engineered, and, for the
time, was relatively easy to drive thanks to a semiautomatic epicyclic
transmission.
Henry Ford (1863–1947) was an intuitive engineer who had trained as
a machinist in Detroit and acquired a deep understanding of
manufacturing techniques. But he never forgot his farmboy roots and
wanted to produce a car of extreme practicality that would benefit the
rural people to whom he felt closest. The flexible, well-sprung Model T
was at home on the unmade rural roads that covered the United States at
that time.
The Model T also has equally great significance as a symbol and
advertisement for Ford’s production-line techniques and became the
focus of the worldwide admiration for what has since become known as
Fordism. It has been suggested that the moving production line is the
perfect realization of the project started in the Enlightenment to turn men
into machines. Thus the eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher Adam
Ferguson wrote, ‘Mechanical arts succeed best under a total suppression
of sentiment and reason. Manufactures prosper where the workshop may
… be considered as an engine, the parts of which are men.’ This could
be a perfect description of Ford’s integrated Highland Park factory.
Intriguingly, Ford and his methods impressed both Adolf Hitler and
Joseph Stalin to an equal degree.
The concrete daylight factory at Highland Park, designed by Albert Kahn, was as much an innovation as the car for whose
production it was designed. The ‘body drop’ here, where the body meets the engine and chassis, became an iconic part of
the car mass-production process. This outdoor section, photographed in 1913, must have been a temporary expedient,
however.

The Ford Model T – ‘the car that motorized America’.

GN CYCLECAR
1910
Two car-mad young men have a dream to create their own brand. They
put their design together in a parent’s garage, and hey presto! – they
have a popular product and an emerging motor business. So simple –
and today so impossible. But not in 1911 when Archibald Frazer-Nash
(1889–1965) and Ronald Godfrey (1887–1968) had just left Finsbury
Technical College, London, with diplomas in engineering and set up their
own company, Godfrey & Nash (GN). Their car had a two-cylinder air-
cooled motor, more like a motorcycle than a car, and accordingly came to
be known as a ‘cyclecar’. By 1920 Archie had set up on his own, building
more substantial Frazer Nash cars based on the same basic architecture.
One feature of the designs was that, instead of a gearbox, they used
chains and sprockets of different sizes to give different speeds. These
ran between an intermediate shaft under the driver’s seat, to the back
axle, and you ‘changed gear’ by dog clutches that shifted the drive from
one chain set to another. This was quick and effective. Moreover, the car
had no differential gear, because the rear axle was a single piece, and
drivers of GNs considered that the cars cornered best with plenty of
throttle.
The GN and Frazer Nash cars epitomized British sporting cars in the
period – spindly and rakish, getting performance from lightness and
simplicity. Super-sporting drivers turned them into improbably frantic hill-
climb ‘specials’ that often beat works entries from MG and Austin, such
as Basil Davenport’s GN Spider, which was always suffused, in the race
paddock, with the fragrant aroma of methylated spirits – the fuel it ran on.
GNs and ‘Nashes’ also helped cultivate the generations of competitive
owner-mechanics who became the backbone of that unique British
institution, the Vintage Sports Car Club. An anonymous member even
memorialized the inventors with this charming doggerel: Nash and
Godfrey hated cogs, Made a car with chain and dogs.
And it worked, but would it if They had made it with a diff?
The GN team at Brooklands for the 200-mile race in 1922. Archie Frazer-Nash is by the central car wearing a cardigan
and his characteristic knitted helmet.

Some home-tuned variants of the GN – such as Basil Davenport’s sprint and hill-climb special Spider – were fearsomely
quick. Davenport in the original Spider 1 at the speed trial on the sands at Skegness, Lincolnshire, c.1920.
AUSTIN SEVEN
c.1922–28
The British-born Herbert Austin (1866–1941) had emigrated to Australia
as a young man and worked in engineering, but he returned to
Birmingham and founded his own company in nearby Longbridge in
1905, soon turning to the new car market. His main products were
soundly engineered mid-range vehicles, but he nurtured a dream, shared
by so many of the industrial pioneers in the auto industry, of making a
really cheap and popular car. In spite of the fears of his co-directors, who
held (as many do today) that a small car means a small profit, Austin set
out to make ‘a decent car for the man who, at present, can afford only a
motorcycle and sidecar’ and invested a lot of his personal fortune into the
design.
The Austin Seven was launched in 1922 as a ‘proper’ small car with a
water-cooled four-cylinder engine (albeit only 750cc), four-wheel brakes
and a weatherproof saloon body if required. It became highly popular and
soon extinguished the market for eccentric light cyclecars like the GN.
Austin reflected that ‘the Seven has done more than anything previously
to bring about my ambition to motorise the masses’. Like Ford before
him, Austin had created a new market for a new type of product.
Austin also produced many intriguing variants of the Seven, including
open tourers, sports versions, full-works racing cars, and a pretty model,
known as the Grasshopper, suited to the then-popular sport of off-road
‘trials’.
In the post-World War II era, old Austin Sevens were so ubiquitous
and cheap that building an Austin Seven special became the easiest way
into racing for numerous designers and drivers. The foundations of British
supremacy today in Formula One design and construction derive from
the background of ingenuity fostered by tuning and adapting Austin
Sevens.
Like many car barons, Herbert Austin wanted to ‘motorize the masses’. The serviceable and cheap Austin Seven proved
that a properly engineered ‘baby’ car was feasible and profoundly altered the British motoring scene.
BUGATTI TYPE 35B
1924
If Ettore Bugatti (1881–1947) had designed only one car, the Type 35B
would be enough to make him immortal. His father, Carlo, was an artist,
jeweller and designer of Art Nouveau furniture so Ettore studied art at the
Accademia Brera in Milan. However, he was also strongly drawn to the
new field of motoring and became an apprentice at the Milan firm of
Prinetti & Stucchi. In 1899 Bugatti won the tricycle class in the Grand Prix
of Reggio Emilia on a Prinetti & Stucchi machine of his own design.
By 1910 Bugatti had set up as a manufacturer at Molsheim, Alsace,
where he produced a fascinating series of high-performance cars that
had extraordinary – even perverse or archaic – features. Bugatti always
refused to be influenced by the mainstream auto industry and has been
called ‘the last of the artist-engineers’, able to build a business around his
own personality and tastes. His designs were strongly influenced by his
car philosophy of le pur sang – the thoroughbred – a reflection of his
passion for horses and dogs. Indeed, his mechanical parts can often
seem organic – the exquisitely forged front axle ends for the Type 35
remind us more of a wrist than a machine part.
The eight-cylinder Type 35, introduced in 1924, has been called the
most aesthetically satisfying racing car ever made. It gained a
phenomenal reputation because, apart from the many Grand Prix races
won by the factory, amateurs, too, could buy one and win. It represents
the high point of Bugatti’s production, for it came at a time when his
factory’s meticulous craftsmanship and hand assembly could produce a
significantly superior performance. Later, as Bugatti sought to keep up
with the increasingly industrialized output of his rivals, the cars became
more thickset and the lightness, poise and accuracy of the Type 35B
were never to be recaptured.
 Original poster from 1925.

H. Heusser in the Buckower Dreieck – a triangular circuit east of Berlin, c.1924. The Type 35 was a ‘catalogue racer’ that
you could buy and win with.
SALMSON SAN SEBASTIAN
1925
The French were the first real automobilistes for they understood that this
new form of mobility was both empowering and chic. During the 1920s
and 1930s, there was a huge flowering of mechanical imagination as
both garagistes and bigger factories innovated and designed new cars,
though many offered eccentric mechanical features that were doomed to
fail.
Levallois-Perret in the northwestern suburbs of Paris was the site of
much of this engineering ferment, and there the Salmson factory
inhabited a works in the wonderfully named rue Point du Jour (‘Street of
Dawn’), producing lissom 1100cc sports cars. Salmson was a proper
engineering firm, making aero engines and industrial tools, which is
perhaps why its car was the best of this new breed.
Light and elegant, with a body style that echoed the far more pricey
racing Bugattis, the Salmsons were powered by a beautiful and
advanced twin-cam engine and put up remarkable performances at Le
Mans and Brooklands where, in 1927, the works’ supercharged car could
lap at more than 100mph. They were the natural competitors of the
Amilcar, which had similar sporting looks but a much cruder engine. (The
dancer Isadora Duncan was in fact in an Amilcar, not a Bugatti as is often
said, when she died, throttled by a trailing scarf.)
Salmsons offered sports-car looks and excitement to many for the first
time (MG in Britain was almost ten years behind Salmson in offering a
light series-produced two-seater), and they set the scene for a type of
leisure vehicle that is represented today by cars such as the Mazda MX-
5.

Emile Petit, the designer, with one of the works’ twin-cam cars at the Miramas circuit, southern France, 1924.
A supercharged Salmson ‘San Sebastian’ model. An impromptu car show at Chiswick during the Boat Race, 1927.
TRACTA
1927
The interwar French motoring scene was peopled with colourful and
inventive characters who believed they were changing the face of popular
motoring. In some cases this was true. In the 1920s Jean-Albert Grégoire
(1899–1992) ran a garage in Versailles that, he said, ‘enabled me to live,
and satisfy in a humble, but constant way, my passion for motor cars’.
Like so many enthusiasts at the time, Grégoire wanted to found his
own car marque and explore his own design ideas. Grégoire’s Tracta
cars, made between 1927 and 1932, were among the first front-wheel
drive cars offered for general sale. It is hard to realize how revolutionary
a change this seemed at the time and Grégoire did much to popularize
the idea, mainly through excellent performances at Le Mans and other
sporting contests. Nonetheless, he remarked, ‘I do not think the Société
des Automobiles Tracta ever succeeded, no matter what the price was, in
selling a car for more than it actually cost.’
Much of Grégoire’s effort was financed by his friend Pierre Fenaille,
though Grégoire later commented ungratefully that his ‘considerable
fortune merely strengthened his innate financial caution’. However, unlike
so many small constructors, Grégoire did make a success of his
business, supplying his swivelling Tracta joints for front-wheel drive to a
number of civil and military users. He also had a brief and less successful
involvement in the Citroën Traction Avant project.
A Tracta at the Junior Car Club trial on 8 March 1930. Front-wheel drive may have helped but the Tracta’s low build also
made for good performance.

The waspish pointed tail was an emblematic feature of 1920s French sports cars.
DYMAXION
1933
Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) was a self-appointed architect, highly
original thinker and compelling speaker who was committed to arguing
his personally imagined ‘rational’ future into being, sometimes in four-
hour lectures. Part of this vision included new industrial system-built
houses for which he coined the name ‘Dymaxion’, a term that feels at
once beckoning, scientific and indecipherable. Of course, the inhabitants
of these new living units were to have a flying car and, accordingly, the
first Dymaxion car design shows stubby inflatable wings. As built, the car
was wingless but was intended to raise its tail and ‘plane’ on two front
wheels – a tendency that made it hard to control at speed; the rear-wheel
steering made it difficult to control when going slow, too!
At a time when mainstream automakers were experimenting with both
rear engines and rear-wheel drives or front engines plus front-wheel
drive, the Dymaxion bucked all the trends by having, uniquely, a rear
engine and front rear-wheel drive. Unfortunately, the prototype was
involved in a fatal accident at the 1933 Chicago World Exposition, though
this may not have been connected with the unconventional aspects of the
design.
The car should perhaps be regarded more as a piece of Modernist
polemics than as a practical vehicle. Togther with the weird body design
devised by Walter Gropius for Adler, the Dymaxion proved for ever that
architects should not meddle with automotive design.
The shape of the future? There is something at once admirable and sad about Buckminster Fuller’s quixotic attempt to
remake the world.
CITROËN TRACTION AVANT
1934
André Citroën’s first business venture, at the age of 22, was making
‘chevron’ gears with special V-shaped teeth – still represented on the
Citroën logo. A brilliant industrialist, engineer and financial gambler,
Citroën (1878–1935) was intensely interested in industrial technique and
in the methods of Henry Ford, which he saw in the United States in 1912.
He was inspired by this latter experience to start and run a successful
armaments factory in Paris during World War I.
After the war, Citroën returned to automobiles, arguing that the future
did not lie with expensive hand-built cars (such as those of Mors, the
company for which he had worked before the war) but with an affordable
and reliable mass-market product. For him, the car was ‘not an
instrument of luxury but essentially an instrument of work’.
Accordingly, he converted the munitions plant on the Quai de Javel for
car production, assembling an extraordinarily talented team, including
chief engineer André Lefèbvre (1894–1963), a graduate of the Ecole
Supérieure d’Aéronautique who had previously worked for the eccentric
aviation and auto pioneer Gabriel Voisin. ‘When you throw a hammer, it
is the head, not the handle that travels first,’ Lefèbvre argued in support
of front engines and front-wheel drive.
The new mid-range car, the Traction Avant, had front-wheel drive,
remarkable roadholding, and excellent strength and durability. Moreover,
it combined advanced French engineering with the latest US production
techniques, for it was the Edward G Budd Company of Philadelphia, the
great pioneer of chassis-less all-steel welded car bodies, that produced
the press tooling and body engineering scheme to make it. How this
collaboration was arranged in the age of the transatlantic steamer is a
story that still needs to be told, but it produced the basis for the modern
family car.
The body style of the Onze Léger, or ‘Traction’, respected the styling that was normal before World War II. However, its
rigid pressed-steel body, weight bias to the front, and front-wheel drive made it the archetype of the modern mid-size
European saloon.
BUGATTI TYPE 57 ATLANTIC
1936
By the mid-1930s the Bugatti factory in Alsace could no longer live on
sales of skinny, swift, nervous near-racers so developed a market for a
more civilized high-speed sports car.
The Type 57 was generally more conventional than previous Bugattis
and owed much to Ettore Bugatti’s eldest son, Jean (1909–39), who was
talented, active and not as stubborn as his father about adopting
necessary trends from the mainstream auto industry. In fact, Jean Bugatti
was in effective control of the factory from 1936, for Ettore, embittered by
a strike and growing communist militancy at the factory, had largely
decamped to Paris where he worked on his new and successful railcar
business and his own design of racing aircraft.
Jean Bugatti would no doubt have continued the success of the
Bugatti marque had he not been killed while testing a racing version of
the Type 57 near the works in 1939. The fact that this occurred at ten
o’clock at night on the open road to Strasbourg, supposedly closed and
policed by employees from the factory, speaks of the unusual
organization of the firm. Sadly, a cyclist evaded or ignored the helpers
and Jean hit a tree as he veered to miss him.
The Atlantic really represents the epitaph on the original Bugatti
enterprise. After Jean’s death, Bugatti design entered a twilight phase.
There were no really new designs and no ruling genius to revive the firm
after the war. The special Atlantic body on some Type 57s was Jean’s
own creation and, while not as fluid as the aerodynamic coachwork being
created in Paris for firms such as Delage and Delahaye, it is a wonderful
and almost eccentric marriage of the streamline idiom with the classic
sports racing car.
Bugatti’s coachwork for his ultra-rapid Type 57.
TATRA T87
1936
The Zeppelin airships used in World War I were responsible for
Germany’s early interest in streamlining – the aerodynamics of these big
structures needed careful treatment if they were to reach a reasonable
speed. With the end of the war and enforced disarmament, Zeppelin
engineer and aerodynamicist Paul Jaray (1889–1974) set out to apply the
new science of streamlining to cars, eventually setting up the Jaray
Streamline Carriage Company in Zurich, Switzerland.
In 1930 Hans Ledwinka (1878–1967), chief designer for Tatra in
Czechoslovakia, with design engineer Erich Übelacker, decided that
properly streamlined bodywork would be the next important technical
development. Ledwinka was one of the great geniuses of automotive
design and had already introduced now-standard items, such as four-
wheel brakes and independent suspension, before many others.
To realize the ideal Jaray shape properly, a rear engine was needed,
which Ledwinka liked because it made for an unusually quiet interior and
dispensed with the propeller shaft between front engine and rear wheels.
This gave a low floor with greater leg space, fewer power losses and
higher efficiency. The early 850cc rear-engined Tatra had a highly
suggestive resemblance to the first prototypes for the KdF-Wagen, or
Volkswagen, and it is alleged that Tatra’s successors received a
substantial legal settlement from VW after World War II for design
infringement.
The Tatra streamline concept reached its height with the very fast 3-
litre air-cooled eight-cylinder T87. This was capable of 100 mph and was
a particular favourite with German army officers – until, that is, crashes
on the new autobahn system led to the Reichswehr banning the model.
As Volkswagen and Porsche designs were also to show, the ‘pendulum
swing’ of a rear engine can bring dangerous handling on fast corners.
Although not fully resolved, and despite a slightly homemade feel to the
body panels, the Tatra streamlined shape is a poignant relic of a
vanished Middle European modernity.
A relic of a vanished European modernity? Sadly, Tatra never recovered the prestige it enjoyed before World War II,
though it did, under communist direction, go on to build serviceable trucks.
BMW 328
1937
In the 1930s sporting British drivers were keen on the gruelling
Continental Alpine Trials, which included some 1,500 miles of high-speed
touring, speed runs on the new autoroutes and long full-throttle climbs at
speed up Alpine passes. These events were a challenging test for cars at
the time and were seen as a useful way to develop performance and
durability.
Frazer Nash factory drivers and private owners from Britain did well in
these events, so the arrival of a new generation of BMW sports car that
often passed the chain-drive British entries came as a shock – so much
so that the British firm rapidly acquired a licence to import and sell the
German cars.
During World War I the Bayerische Motoren Werke had started
making aero engines (the blue-and-white BMW logo is said to represent
a spinning propeller disc) but postwar had gone into car and motorcycle
production. The 328 was perhaps the first modern sports car with a rigid
box-section chassis, new standards of roadholding and a powerful and
original six-cylinder engine.
After World War II, all this fine technology passed to the Bristol aircraft
company in the UK, as an element of war reparation. With this ‘flying
start’, Bristol made some impressive and expensive aerodynamic saloons
on the BMW design base, but while BMW itself recovered from wartime
devastation to become the extraordinary firm we know today, the high-
tech and profitable Bristol company, though cosseted by government
defence contracts, became submerged in the amalgamations of the UK
aircraft sector and its car production withered away – just one more
mystery in the history of technological successions.
 The original six-cylinder engine.

The first modern sports car? The BMW 328 instantly made British equivalents seem dated. Postwar, it formed the basis for
Bristol cars.
TOURING-BODIED ALFA ROMEO
8C 2900B LE MANS SPECIAL
1938
There is an evocative 1930s picture of two girls at the Touring
coachworks factory in Milan effortlessly holding the complete inner-body
framework for a Lancia Aprilia. This is Touring’s famous Superleggera
(‘superlight’) construction system, in which a complete inner basketwork
of tubes defines and supports an outer skin in sheet aluminium alloy.
Carrozzeria Touring was one of the glories of the great age of the
automobile in Italy and formed a wonderful symbiosis with Alfa Romeo,
also in Milan. Felice Bianchi Anderloni (1883–1948), the man who
steered it, was a deep thinker, interested in both aerodynamics and
structural engineering, but also chic, immaculately turned out and gifted
with unerring good taste. During his early career he worked at Isotta
Fraschini, rubbing shoulders with car stars such as the Maserati brothers.
The body conceived for the Alfa Romeo’s 1939 Le Mans race entry
represents the ultimate evolution of Touring’s aerodynamic and aesthetic
thinking before World War II called a halt to development. It preserves, in
an extraordinary way, the ghostly outlines of the ‘classical’ vintage car,
which seem to be morphing before our eyes into a true wind-sculpted,
modern shape. After 1945, this was to be the point of departure for the
Cisitalia and the postwar ‘Italian line’.
During the 1950s Touring remained influential and formed strong
associations in the UK with Bristol, Jensen and, above all, Aston Martin,
which built its cars on the Superleggera system for many years. In terms
of pure ‘class’, Touring was unequalled, but, sadly, it failed to transform
itself from bespoke coachbuilder into a global consultancy such as
Bertone and Pininfarina and the firm folded in 1964.
 The inner framework of steel tubes for Touring’s patent ‘superlight’ body system.

As far as it got before World War II – performance streamlining applied to Alfa Romeo’s Le Mans contender. BMW liked it
so much that it commissioned a near-identical body for the 328 entered in Le Mans the following year.
CISITALIA BERLINETTA
1946
When New York’s Museum of Modern Art selected a Cisitalia Berlinetta
for display in 1951, car designers felt just recognition had come to them
at last. Architects and industrial designers were busy creating a new
world, but they often denigrated the seductive tricks that car designers
deployed with chrome, fins and annual model changes. The beautifully
balanced Cisitalia proved that the control of automotive form was a real
sculptural art.
However, there were deeper reasons, both cultural and aesthetic, that
lay behind the huge reputation of the Cisitalia. For a start, Fiat’s factories
lay almost silent in 1945, as the front line of war swept over northern
Italy, and the Cisitalia, conceived in Turin by businessman and racing
driver Piero Dusio (1899–1975), represented an automotive renaissance.
On an aesthetic level, too, the car represents the resolution of the
trend towards the integration of the various separate parts of old-style car
bodywork that had been progressing throughout the 1930s. In the last
years of peace, the Touring coachwork company in Milan had produced a
marvellous streamlined body for the Alfa Romeo 8C – its 1938 Le Mans
entry (see the previous entry) – but, though sublime from some angles, it
was, from the side view, still quite massive and heavy in the ‘shoulders’.
For the Cisitalia, Battista ‘Pinin’ Farina (1893–1966) took the same
aesthetic roots but made them gel. The curves make a perfect appeal to
our perception of aerodynamics, while the wheel arches and wings
(fenders) have a powerful animalistic quality, evoking the front paws and
rear haunches of a leopard at rest and speaking to some subconscious
archetype of power and drive. This form was to influence the Italian
‘sporting line’ that Ferrari and the other great Italian marques were to use
for decades to come, and even found an echo in Britain with the sporting
Jaguars.
The war is over and the future starts here. The perfect stance of the Cisitalia Berlinetta shows why Pininfarina still cite it as
a definitive point in the company’s design development.
ORIGINAL VOLKSWAGEN
1946
The original Volkswagen had the longest production run of any car.
Prototypes arrived in Nazi Germany in 1938, though none, in fact, was
ever sold to workers saving up their 1,000 Reichsmarks through Hitler’s
‘Strength through Joy’ scheme. Proper production began in 1946 and the
final ‘Beetle’ was produced at VW’s Mexican plant in 2003. By that time
21 million had been produced, making it, numerically, the most popular
car ever.
So why don’t cars look like Beetles any more? The reason is that the
car was born in the imaginations of Adolf Hitler and Ferdinand Porsche
(1875–1951) as a uniquely modernistic project ‘to further the motorization
of the German people’. As such, it had to express a strong Germanic
Modernist aesthetic and the ‘apparent aerodynamic’ form developed by
ex-Zeppelin engineer Paul Jaray and the Czech design engineers at
Tatra – a make much admired by Hitler, a noted car buff. In fact, notes
exist, believed to be by Hitler, from the 1933 meeting with Porsche at
Berlin’s Kaiserhof Hotel. Hitler has apparently sketched a generic
aerodynamic Tatra/Beetle shape, though whether as a suggestion to
Porsche, or as a visualization of what was under discussion, is not clear.
This Jaray/Tatra form, when squashed onto a much smaller utility car,
strongly compromised passenger accommodation. Porsche chose a flat
‘boxer’ engine in the rear to indulge the streamline tail and also equipped
the car with swing axles – a simple and bad form of independent rear
suspension. These features combined could allow dangerous rear-end
breakaway on greasy surfaces.
Nevertheless, the Beetle was conceived, all at once, as a single
integrated engineering solution with no ‘ad hoc’ solutions or ‘legacy’
components from earlier models. The body structure was superb, rigid,
watertight and corrosion-resistant, and the quality of the mechanical parts
was unusually high for a popular car. Germany’s preeminence in
electromechanical engineering also meant that the electrical equipment
(starter motor, ignition equipment and dynamo), often the Achilles’ heel of
most budget cars at the time, was excellent, so a Beetle always started
on cold, damp mornings. The VW’s success was a triumph of good
engineering over questionable chassis design.

The original Beetle.

There is a compelling theatre in car production lines. The VW Wolfsburg plant in 1953. The convex curves and the relief
details in every panel gave the Beetle bodywork incredible rigidity.
FERRARI 125S
1947
In the morally ambiguous postwar period in Italy where accusations of
fascist sympathies or collaboration flew about, Gioachino Colombo
(1903–87), one of Alfa Romeo’s top racing car designers, and pupil of the
great Alfa Romeo designer Vittorio Jano (1891– 1965), found himself
suspended owing to various ‘political misunderstandings’. Alfa Romeo,
moreover, had had to forsake sporting cars in favour of utility products
such as cookers, as well as the cheapest cars, so Colombo must have
been delighted to receive a call from Enzo Ferrari (1898–1988).
Ferrari, of course, had previously run the prewar Alfa Romeo racing
team. Like many engineers in the postwar era, he was forced to do utility
jobs but he was itching to make his own 1500cc racing car and asked
Colombo what general design principles he would adopt. ‘Maserati has a
first-class eight-cylinder machine, the English have the ERA six-cylinder
job, and Alfa has its own 8C. In my view you should be making a twelve
cylinder.’ Colombo recalled the reply as, ‘My dear Colombo, you read my
thoughts. I’ve been dreaming of building a twelve-cylinder for years. Let’s
get to work straight away.’
The car that emerged was actually drawn up in Colombo’s Milan
bedroom and one cannot underestimate what an ambitious and virtuoso
achievement this first Ferrari was, especially given the conditions of the
time. Subsequently, some have decried Colombo’s work, comparing his
designs unfavourably with those of his successor, Aurelio Lampredi
(1917–89), but there is no doubt that Colombo had great talent, for he
later developed the Maserati 250F – the greatest Grand Prix car of its
generation, and the one in which the legendary British driver Stirling
Moss came to prominence. It is no exaggeration to claim that Colombo
created the ancestral architecture of the entire Ferrari range.
The first Ferrari – the 125S at the factory entrance, Maranello, 1947. We can be sure that the autocratic Enzo Ferrari was
not consulted about the strident communist graffiti scrawled over the gateway.
LAND ROVER
1948
The Rover company of Coventry, England, had a fine history, dating back
to the 1880s when its founder, John Kemp Starley (1854–1901), invented
the ‘safety bicycle’ – the modern, lower form of bicycle that for the first
time women felt able to ride.
Rover grew as an engineering-led company, making sound, quality
cars aimed to appeal to professional types, rather than speed seekers,
and during World War II was enlisted to manufacture the Whittle jet
engine in quantity. This tangled saga led to bitter recriminations from its
inventor, Frank Whittle, who accused Rover of attempting to take over his
brainchild and of making unauthorized and deleterious changes to his
design. Rover handed the hot potato on to Rolls-Royce, but its amended
design was an important step towards the postwar Rolls-Royce jets.
After the war, Rover returned to car production, but partner and chief
designer Maurice Wilks (1904–63), who ran a war-surplus Willys Jeep on
his farm, realized how useful a similar four-wheel-drive vehicle would be,
especially one that was less spartan and had a greater general utility
than the Jeep. Thus Land Rover was born as a British attempt to make a
reliable and sturdy country vehicle. It was to use as many parts from the
Rover saloon car range as possible, while body parts were mainly flat,
with straight folds, to avoid expensive press tools.
The Land Rover appeared in 1948 to tremendous acclaim and by
1951 was outselling ordinary Rover cars by two to one. It had robust
engineering, was functionally excellent and was decades ahead of any
rival. Moreover it won extensive orders from police, military and
government agencies, not only in the UK but also all around the world.
The Rover company had the ball at its feet.
Boxy, robust and effective, for decades the Land Rover had no rivals anywhere.
PIAGGIO APE
1948
The little Vespa-based truck that was once such a familiar sight on Italy’s
roads is an interesting comment on how self-indulgent much innovation
can be. The tiny truck was perfectly suited to small farmers and
tradesmen and was just the right size for the narrow streets of old
European towns. It was also cheap to buy and, for its day, extremely fuel-
efficient. Today’s van driver might not appreciate having to make
deliveries in an Ape. However, as large, fast and heavy as today’s vans
often are, they run three-quarters empty for most of their lives. An Ape
with a tiny engine could often do the job.
After World War II, Italy was fertile ground for the development of new
‘minimal motoring’ solutions and, because Piaggio was barred from
building aircraft, the aeronautical engineer and helicopter pioneer
Corradino D’Ascanio (1891–1981) came up with a new, rational and
integrated two-wheeler, soon to be called the Vespa (‘wasp’ in Italian)
owing to its buzzing sound and pointed tail.
D’Ascanio’s clever integrated engine and drive package, as well as
the pressed-steel frame and steering arrangement, made it easy to
rearrange these elements in a light tricycle truck christened the Ape
(‘bee’). The economy and versatility of the concept has appealed to
artisans and retailers over the generations and Piaggio also has a huge
production of these light trucks from factories in India, China and
Vietnam.
 Original 1940s poster.

Economy and suitability for small loads. The qualities that made the Ape a favourite in Italy for small traders and
countrymen also made it a hit in many Asian countries.
CITROËN 2CV
1949
Sadly, the launch of the revolutionary Citroën Traction Avant coincided
with the financial collapse of the overcommitted Citroën empire, and the
final illness of André Citroën (1878–1935) himself. The control of Citroën
passed to the Michelin tyre company (one of the biggest creditors), which
ran the company in a singularly enlightened way for decades and drafted
in, as joint manager, a former architect and World War I flyer, Pierre-
Jules Boulanger (1885–1950). Tall, austere and never without a Gitane in
hand, Boulanger loved driving and, like chief engineer André Lefèbvre
(1894–1963), understood that the key to a fine car was good roadholding
and suspension behaviour that kept the wheels in contact with the road –
‘la liaison au sol’.
Boulanger saw that France was changing and in 1936 set a brief for a
‘simple spartan transport’. The rural farmer, he argued, had a right to his
own special car – one with compliant suspension that could cope with the
rough unmade back roads ‘without breaking an egg’. What was needed
was a small and cheap ‘motorized pony cart … four wheels under an
umbrella’ that could carry two farmers wearing clogs, 60 kg of potatoes or
a small cask of wine – in fact, a minimalist vehicle of a type never built
before. As for the eggs, a suspension system with springs interlinked
front to rear would give Boulanger’s answer, the 2CV, the potential to
cross rough roads smoothly at remarkable speed.
The distinctly odd prewar prototypes with single headlight and
aluminium corrugated body skins were, fortunately, destroyed or hidden
during World War II, but what emerged at the 1948 Paris Motor Show
was far better considered. Some journalists judged it a ‘grave error’ but
thousands of customers queued to place orders. The English car writer L
J K Setright called it ‘the most intelligent application of minimalism ever to
succeed as a car’ and this unique French icon stayed in production until
1990.
Could anything be more French? Some see in the original O-shaped door enclosures of the first 2CVs an echo of a
‘Bauhaus circle’ and a heritage of ex-architect and Citroën boss Pierre-Jules Boulanger.
BUICK LESABRE CONCEPT CAR
1951
This General Motors styling exercise is emblematic of the extraordinary
efflorescence of ornament and jet-plane imagery in the auto industry of
the post-World War II United States. It also might be said to be a typical
creation of GM’s design chief, Harley Earl (1893–1969), famous for his
crushingly intimidating personality and lots of pale suits, often changed
twice a day. Then, of course, there is the relationship between Earl’s
design imagination and the development of the business model of
planned obsolescence – a symbiosis that led the US car industry, by the
1960s, to what the US activist Ralph Nader has called ‘a glittering
pinnacle of triviality’.
However, the real importance of the LeSabre lies elsewhere. Like
Earl’s Buick ‘Y’ job of 1937, it was one of the first ‘concept cars’ – a new
idea in the car world. Concept cars were built both to intrigue and to lead
public taste by signalling what was coming soon. More importantly, these
cars made real experiments with sculptural forms and motifs and enabled
designers and manufacturers to see how these might gel.
At GM, Earl established technical procedures that have become
fundamental to the practice of car design around the world. Most
important is the use of modelling clay, a technique that frankly admits that
car design is a sculptural art. GM also introduced the use of the styling
bridge, a rigid measuring tool in the form of an arch that was passed over
the full-sized model from front to back, allowing precise measurements of
the form to be taken as ‘slices’ at numerous ‘stations’. This data in effect
constitutes a mathematical 3D model of the car and is vital for the
production of the purpose-made press tools that will translate the model
into series-produced steel bodies. This mathematical procedure,
moreover, was an essential step in the development of the computer-
modelling techniques used today.
Harley Earl and the LeSabre. The sculptural complexity of the car (whatever you think of it) shows GM’s incredible control
of the processes of clay modelling and then transforming shapes into sheet steel – technical procedures established at
GM that spread throughout the industry.
BERTONE BAT
1953
In the 1950s the Turin Motor Show – the Salone dell’automobile di Torino
– was an exceptional event. In a wonderful arched exhibition hall
designed by Pier Luigi Nervi, the north Italian design houses vied to
demonstrate their imagination and technical ability to the world’s
carmakers with some of the most fabulous styling exercises ever created.
Franco Scaglione (1916–93) arrived at Bertone from the aircraft
industry in 1951, after a short, unsuccessful relationship with Pininfarina,
and began to apply his aerodynamic ideas to experimental cars. His BAT
5 (for Berlinetta Aerodinamica Tecnica) was the sensation of the 1953
Turin show, but it was more than a sensational catch-penny glamour
exercise – it had 38 per cent less drag than the ‘donor’ car, meaning that
a 50 per cent larger engine would have been needed to give the standard
Alfa Romeo the same performance. These aerodynamic ideas certainly
percolated through to Alfa Romeo competition and road cars.
Scaglione was followed at Bertone first by Giorgetto Giugiaro (1938–)
and then by Marcello Gandini (1938–). These three outstanding
designers made Bertone, for a while, the centre of maximum imagination
for the development of the postwar car, and their selection is a tribute to
the judgment of proprietor Giuseppe ‘Nuccio’ Bertone (1914–97).
Franco Scaglione’s BAT series is a supple and fluid response to an imagined modernity that exposes the crudity of the
allusions in the LeSabre (see page 44). The BAT series also speaks of the peerless skill of Torinese craftsmen in hand-
forming and welding sheet aluminium.
ALFA ROMEO GIULIETTA SPRINT
1954
The beautiful Giulietta Sprint grew out of a programme by the Italian
‘state industries board’ to help revive the country’s troubled post-World
War II economy with the development of a small and popular Alfa
Romeo. This was a new market for the performance-minded Milan firm
and the industry board helped finance the development of the new
1300cc Giulietta saloon by selling thousands of lottery tickets. Each of
the 500 lucky winners was to receive one of the new cars.
Embarrassingly, when the date of the prize draw came, none of the cars
had yet been completed.
The solution was to find a specialized low-volume coachbuilder to
make a special sports version of the car, appease the bond winners and
save Alfa Romeo (and the government agency) from scandal. Initially the
project went to the Ghia company in Turin and design chief Mario Boano
sketched the car. Unfortunately, Ghia could not deliver on time, while
Boano was also at loggerheads with his partner, Luigi Segre. Thus the
job passed to Nuccio Bertone and the final form of the Giulietta Sprint
was refined in plaster, it is said, by Boano, Bertone himself, and his new
stylist, Franco Scaglione (1916–93).
The car became a fantastic success, partly because it was neat and
lovely, but also because, being Alfa Romeo, the engine department
designed a sporting engine – a beautiful aluminium twin-cam jewel that
literally sang, giving 80 horsepower at 6,000rpm – a terrific performance
for 1954. It remained the basis for Alfa’s smaller engines for decades to
come.
The Giulietta Sprint made its debut at the 1954 Turin Motor Show and
was a fantastic hit, selling 40,000 units and staying in production for 13
years. The success of this model alone virtually made the Bertone
company, which developed a small-scale production line to build it.
Bertone himself later remarked, ‘If Alfa Romeo had known that so many
Giulietta Sprints were to be built, it certainly would not have
commissioned me, but would have built them in its own works at
Portello.’

A stopgap that proved a gem. The success of the Giulietta Sprint derived from the tremendous design and craft skills that
were on tap in Turin.
FIAT TURBINA
1954
In April 1954 Fiat’s famous Lingotto rooftop track echoed to a new sound
– a jet wail that came from Fiat’s new gas turbine experiment. After joking
that he should maybe wear a parachute, veteran test driver Carlo
Salomano took the machine gently round the banked oval.
A few days later, the car reappeared at Turin’s Caselle Airport for
some high-speed runs, and also put some laps at Monza and Castel
Furano before the Rome Grand Prix. Its potential top speed probably
exceeded 200mph, though this was never established, and Fiat
engineers, like their rivals at Rover and Chrysler, were realizing that the
gas turbine gave extremely poor fuel economy in passenger cars.
Turbina had its greatest success at the 1954 Turin Motor Show where the
futuristic lines attracted enormous interest. Today it is in the city’s motor
museum.
The Turbina was a bid to investigate the new gas turbine for road
vehicles, but also to proclaim Fiat’s re-emergence as a technological
force after the war years. Whereas in the UK Rover buried its
experimental turbine in a modified body shell from a near-standard
‘Aunty’ model, Fiat let rip with wonderful Buck Rogers styling conceived
by visionary engineer Luigi Fabio Rapi (1902–1977) and realized by the
incomparable craft skills of Turin’s metalworkers. It was everything a wild
leap of imagination should be and proved that Futurism was not dead.
Who cares that it scarcely turned a wheel? Even today it still perfectly
fulfils its destiny to be a jet car.
Handmade in Fiat’s experimental shop, the Turbina drew on contemporary sci-fi iconography and promised a future that
has never arrived.
PANHARD DYNA
1954
Aluminium production had been vastly expanded in most industrialized
countries during the late 1930s for wartime aviation. The resulting post-
World War II glut was a stimulus to design in many countries. One Italian
designer called it the ‘Mussolini metal’ and the widespread availability of
the material influenced products in Italy from Gaggia coffee machines to
Olivetti typewriters.
In France the search for new outlets led the giant Aluminium Français
concern to team up with serial automotive inventor Jean-Albert Grégoire
(1898–1992) of Tracta to design an allaluminium car for the postwar
world. Eventually produced as the light and clever front-drive Dyna, the
car was a new step for the ancient and august luxury Panhard make, but
it was genuinely useful and had excellent economy, thanks to an
aerodynamic shape and an efficient, simple two-cylinder motor.
The Dyna was an interesting design experiment at a time when no
one was quite sure what a car should look like any more. Its use of
aluminium, however, proved a dead end – though touted as the metal of
the future, since then its use in bodies for popular cars has remained
limited. Poor Grégoire, too, evidently found his path as an independent
designer a struggle, commenting, ‘The hard law of life … does not
tolerate people receiving reward for their perseverance and labours
without dealing out bitter disappointments in return.’
The aluminium egg. The Dyna Panhard was an excellent and innovative entrant to the popular car market, though, like so
many unusual alternatives, it was eventually extinguished by the forces of amalgamation, homogenization and
globalization. In 1965 Panhard was absorbed by Citroën.
CITROËN DS
1955
Design writers groping for gravitas are fond of quoting Roland Barthes’s
comment that cars are the ‘exact equivalent of the great Gothic
cathedrals … the supreme creation of an era, conceived with passion by
unknown artists’. The French phenomenologist’s later comment that the
display of the DS at motor shows represents ‘the very essence of petit-
bourgeois advancement’ is less well known, however. Nevertheless, it is
more helpful, and more interesting, to comprehend the DS in its historical
context – as the very essence of the French postwar technocratic spirit.
This was a time when the polytechniciens, iron-grey hair cut en brosse,
were rebuilding French pride with the atomic power project, jet planes
and high-rise blocks.
The new Citroën project was launched with Pierre Boulanger’s brief to
‘study all possibilities, including the impossible’. The car was to be ‘the
world’s best, most beautiful, most comfortable and most advanced … a
masterpiece, to show the world and the US car factories in particular, that
Citroën and France could develop the ultimate vehicle’. The extraordinary
glazing pattern, the entirely original profile and combination of body
planes, the high-level indicators coming out of the roof gutter – a feature
that could have gone so wrong! – the headlamps swivelling as you
steered: all pronounced that this was, indeed, an inimitable car.
Technical leader was André Lefèbvre (1894–1963) with styling input
from house Citroën designer Flaminio Bertoni (1903–64). However, the
greatest technical innovation in the car was the creation of hydraulic
suspension by the visionary engineer Paul Magès (1908–99), who
replaced the conventional springs with a self-levelling and adaptive
system of hydraulic struts supplied by an engine-driven pump. Magès
used the same high-pressure hydraulic system to power the steering and
brakes, creating a car that felt like no other, needing only the gentlest
fingertip control on the wheel to avoid slaloming onto the wrong side of
the road, and a brake pedal – just a button really – so sensitive that it felt
like an on/off switch. Not all drivers liked the extreme sensitivity of these
controls but the Citroën response, in effect, was, ‘This is the future; this is
how a car should be. Get used to it!’ Some drivers never could, but for
many it seemed quite perfect.

Citroën designer Flaminio Bertoni had an extraordinary achievement with the DS. It was all the more impressive because,
unlike at Ferrari or Jaguar, there were no predecessors to allow designers and modellers to perfect its new form language.
The DS sprang fully formed into the world.
FIAT 600
1955
The Fiat 600 was conceived as a direct replacement for the front-engined
prewar Topolino, which was both cramped and, by now, long in the tooth.
Chief engineer Dante Giacosa (1905–96) was nudged by the Fiat
management to stay with the ��orthodox’ layout (front engine and rear
drive) but considered that the ambition to seat four adults in a vehicle
only 3.22m (126in) long – no longer than the old two-seat Topolino –
could be met only either by a front engine and front-wheel drive or by a
rear engine with rear-wheel drive, integrating engine, gearbox and final
drive. Front drive was attractive but Giacosa was not confident about
finding swivelling constant-velocity drive joints that would be cheap
enough yet reliable.
Giacosa later recalled the exhilaration, as the body model took shape,
of seeing ‘the creamy smooth plaster … spread rapidly over the wooden
framework before it hardened … I myself filed away at the initial shape to
get rid of angular edges and achieve the maximum compactness.’ This is
interesting because it confirms that Italy was then still using classical
hard gesso (plaster of Paris) for modelling, rather than the scrapeable
moist-clay technique used in the United States and the rest of Europe.
The resulting vehicle was aesthetically almost perfect – an egglike,
single-volume car with the utmost economy and structural efficiency of
pressed-steel bodywork. Moreover, thanks to careful development it was
safe to drive and lacked the fatal oversteer of cars such as the Beetle
and Corvette. It was literally the car that got Italy moving again after the
war and it gave rise to the architecturally similar, but even smaller, Fiat
Nuova 500.
Dante Giacosa was one of the great ‘car men’, with a holistic understanding of body design, powerplants and production.
Fiat and Giacosa developed a mass-production aesthetic that owed little to the United States or anyone else.
AUSTIN FX4 TAXI
1956
Travelling in a Chicago cab lurching on expiring springs and with knee
room sacrificed to allow space for the bullet-resistant screen behind the
driver gives reason to thank London’s Public Carriage Office. This body
has set design criteria for motorized taxis since 1906, though it had ruled
on horse-drawn cabs since 1679. These benevolent despots have
presided over a local market distortion that has brought immeasurable
benefit to London cab passengers.
It’s obvious that mid-sized cars are constructed to flatter and pamper
the driver and that rear passenger comfort is not a priority. So when
these vehicles are converted to taxis, as in almost every other city on the
globe, they give a rotten experience to the paying rear-seat passengers –
dank, foetid, inconvenient to hose out, awkward to climb in and out of, too
low, and with poor visibility – a sickening recipe.
The definitive London cab was designed in 1956 by Austin body
designer and draughtsman Eric Bailey, apparently because the in-house
‘stylist’, Dick Burzi, wanted nothing to do with it. Bailey referenced current
Austin saloons and Anglo-American looks in the fender and body sides
(he had just finished work on the Austin-made Metropolitan made for
Nash in the United States), but the principal design driver was the
passenger space required by the beneficent Carriage Office.
The successor to the Austin cab is the TX4, built by LTI. It has, of
course, gone through various redesigns, but its genes are still essentially
those of the 1956 Austin FX4 and it has remained as much a symbol of
London as the double-decker bus. Long may it continue to defy
globalization.
The London black cab is a benign market distortion that owes its existence not to market forces but to an institution – the
Public Carriage Office. Pensioner examples also grace a few other British cities.
LOTUS ELITE
1957
Colin Chapman (1928–82) was a brilliant, charming, innovative designer,
engineer and entrepreneur who arrived in frontline racing. His path to the
formation of the Lotus company, and to racing car construction, was
through studying engineering at University College, London, while also
selling used cars beside his father’s pub in Hornsey. A spell in the Royal
Air Force gave him a real understanding of lightweight structures that
complemented his natural left-field thinking. He deployed this whether he
was designing to eliminate structure weight, blagging deliveries from
suppliers on credit, or skating his way through the construction rules in
Formula One.
Chapman was among the first to understand the new design rules for
car performance. The car chassis and body needed to be light and rigid,
preferably integrated as a structural monocoque shell, while the
suspension could be softer and tuned for the correct compliance to road
or track. This was pretty much the reverse of the traditional architecture
used by rivals such as Ferrari and Maserati. As a result, a Lotus was
often quicker despite its engine being usually less powerful.
The Elite, introduced in 1957, was Chapman’s first road car made for
general sale. Glass fibre had made small production runs affordable and
the Elite was the first glass-fibre monocoque, with a remarkably
successful body sketched by Lotus associate Peter Kirwan-Taylor. Frank
Costin, aerodynamicist at de Havilland, honed the aerodynamics. Other
features included racing car features such as all-independent suspension
and all-round disc brakes. It also used the terrific ex-fire pump Coventry
Climax engine, previously used by Chapman for track cars.
Dynamically the Elite was almost perfect, given its date. Cornering
was awesome, performance was great for the engine size, and fuel
economy was terrific, thanks to the low drag body. However, as a road
car it demanded lots of maintenance and forgiveness. The name itself,
wags and disenchanted owners used to say, told you what to expect –
Lotus stood for ‘Lots Of Trouble Usually Serious’.

Fast, fragile, flawed … The Lotus Elite derived terrific performance from a 1200cc Coventry Climax engine thanks to its
light weight and slippery shape.
TRABANT
1957
According to the old joke, a customer walked into a Trabant dealer and
asked if he could order a car with a two-tone paint job. ‘Well, why not also
have a Blaupunkt radio and stereo tape player, or wait a little longer’, the
saleman replied, ‘and you can have it with air-conditioning and antilock
brakes, too.’ ‘That’s not funny,’ the punter protested. ‘You’re making a
fool of me.’ ‘Well,’ the salesman said, ‘you started it.’
But behind the image of a gruesomely utilitarian and ersatz East
German car that customers had to wait years to get is a story of skill and
industrial pride. Zwickau, home of the Trabant, had made the sound two-
stroke DKW car since before World War II and this formed the basis for
postwar developments. The two-stroke motor, though not especially
efficient, was cheap to make and to maintain, owing to its low number of
moving parts. A noteworthy innovation for the Trabant was the use of
Duroplast – a phenolic plastic reinforced with a wool or cotton fibre filler –
for unstressed bodywork components.
When the Berlin wall finally came down, thousands of East Germans
and others from the former Soviet satellites used the car to stream west
in search of new homes and jobs. Soon, though, their new and more
environmentally conscious hosts began to complain about both the
pollution of the smoky two-stroke exhaust and the remarkable
persistence of Duroplast, which has defied attempts at recycling.
Nonetheless, the Trabant remains the symbol of a huge structural
change for Germany that few expected they would live to see.

Packaging for the ‘Trabbie’ toy, 1970.

Not that pretty, but the two-stroke Trabant let Eastern European owners hold onto the precious gift of mobility.
MINI
1959
In the 1950s the British Motor Corporation (formed by the merger of the
Austin and Morris brands) was still highly profitable and adept at
production. In 1956 BMC boss Leonard Lord brought designer Alec
Issigonis (1906–88) back from Alvis to create a new range of popular
cars.
When the bungled Suez invasion led to an oil boycott of Britain by
Arab states and petrol rationing in the UK the first priority became a really
small new car. Suspension designer Alex Moulton (1920–) recalled
driving to meet Issigonis in a single-cylinder three-wheeler Heinkel
bubble car (‘simply a device for getting 60 miles to the gallon’). Issigonis
sniffed and revealed that Lord had asked him to design a real economy
car, but ‘whatever it is, it won’t have one cylinder and three wheels. It’s
going to have four cylinders and four wheels.’
The key to the package lay in the use of front-wheel drive, new small
wheels to save space, and a transverse engine with integrated gearbox
‘sharing the same bathwater’. All these were then ambitious steps for a
budget car. It is often said that great designs arise from tough constraints
and the target for the Mini was a compact four-seater within a length of
only 10ft (3.04m). The design team recalled that it had had to fight for
every quarter inch.
The Mini was designed by Issigonis with a few trusted intermediaries,
who later remarked, ‘We were there to do things his way.’ In turn, the
Mini gave rise to Issigonis’s bigger and immensely successful Austin
1100. One colleague recalled that, ‘None of them were committee
motorcars. Just one man breaking all the rules. It’s not cheap to work that
way, but he revolutionized the world’s motoring.’
 The expressed external seams of the Mini simplified welding and anticipated the ‘Pompidou Centre aesthetic’ by
externalizing technical features that were formerly buried. Les wisely, Issigonis also ignored engineering convention for the
underbody and early models filled up with rainwater.
SAAB 96
1960
The first Saab car, planned by the Saab’s parent Swedish aviation
company as World War II came to an end, reflects a moment of calm and
privilege, far from the awful events taking place across the Baltic, and the
point when the Swedish brand of Modernism finally reached auto design.
The mechanical design for the car was done by a tiny team of adept
aviation engineers, unfamiliar as they were with automotive design.
Perhaps for that reason, the quality of the car and its subcomponents
was much higher than small carmakers elsewhere were used to
providing. The Saab started out as a highly advanced but practical
vehicle with independent front-wheel drive and front suspension.
Unfortunately, cash constraints imposed a two-stroke engine, based on
those used in German prewar economy cars such as the DKW, though
the Saab version was civilized to an unusual degree by airflow specialists
from the aeroengine firm Svenska Flygmotor.
The body style originated with designs from a remarkable autodidact
designer, Sixten Sason (1912–67), who had a science-fiction imagination
for machines that had not yet been invented. Between him and the more
conservative factory draughtsmen, a rational body form emerged that is
the most perfect realization of the Jaray-inspired aerodynamic European
streamline Modernism. The Saab won the Monte Carlo Rally three times,
proving the honesty of its design, and it showed by its durability and
safety that economical cars could also offer high quality. Eventually,
though, the lawnmower smell and the oddity of putting oil in the gas tank
led to a switch to a Ford-built four-stroke motor.
 Erik Carlsson in the Monte Carlo Rally, 1963.

Front-wheel drive and independent front suspension made for an advanced package in the late 1940s when the Saab was
first conceived by aeronautical engineers.
CITROËN AMI
1961
By the late 1950s Citroën was sensing a gap in its product range
between the space-age DS and the rustic 2CV. The solution was a new
car based on the engine and mechanical layout of the 2CV with entirely
new, more spacious bodywork that was intended, one assumes, to have
had some aesthetic link with the revolutionary DS. If this was, in fact, the
intention, it failed utterly, for the Ami has been called one of the ugliest
cars ever made.
Its visual oddity comes from translating a formal language that
belongs to a quite different type of car. The DS had a geometry that was
broad, low, crablike and opulent. The Ami was pinched, high, narrow and
utilitarian. However, the back-sloping rear window, which added an extra
element of grotesquerie, was not simply borrowed from the more
perverse US styling elements of the time, but was necessary to provide
the cabin length required for a mid-sector car.
However, the Ami did have something, for by 1966 it had become
France’s bestselling car, though it never caught on elsewhere. Curiously,
it never carried a Citroën badge, perhaps because it was plain that no
other company could have made the car, or maybe because the weird
jumble of converging planes and trim lines at the front left no room for
one. Later, Amis were given the flat four-cylinder engine designed for the
follow-on GS model, which gave them almost 90mph performance –
insanely fast for this skinny eggshell.
However, in one sense the aesthetic particularities of the Citroën Ami
are a delight. It is wonderful to know that there was once a time when
national aesthetics were so marked and could vary so wildly from one
country to another. The Ami is a poignant reminder of the days when the
luxury of national identity in design was still possible.
For all its weirdness, the Ami should be cherished, for it speaks of a time when expressing national identity in automobile
design was a permissible indulgence.
JAGUAR E-TYPE
1961
Jaguar in the 1950s was a pool of extraordinary talent. William Lyons
(1901–85), at the helm, had taken the company from building motorcycle
sidecars to becoming a fully fledged high-performance marque. World
War II contracts for aircraft spars certainly helped improve the technical
skills of the workforce, so Jaguar used argon-arc aluminium welding on
its postwar light-alloy structures. During the war, too, the basic design for
the magnificent six-cylinder 3.4-litre XK engine was established by
principal engineer William Heynes (1904–89), supposedly while on fire-
watching duty during air raids. This robust, beautiful and powerful unit
was developed after the war by ex-Bentley engine maestro Walter
Hassan with tuning wizard Harry Weslake and was to underpin Jaguar’s
racing and road car programmes for decades.
In 1948 the new Jaguar XK120 was the star of the London Motor
Show, beginning a serious commitment to sports car racing that
culminated in the sensuous D-Type and its numerous Le Mans victories.
The D-Type body was developed by Loughborough-trained
aerodynamicist Malcolm Sayer (1916–70), who brought his wartime
design experience with the Bristol Aeroplane Company to bear, using
closely guarded mathematical techniques. There may have been an
element of ‘snake oil’ in his secret tables but, though rival cars were often
more powerful, the Jaguars usually had the highest top speed. Sayer was
also far ahead of his contemporaries in realizing that aerodynamic goals
included defeating lift at high speed, and in giving his cars good stability
from side wind gusts.
The E-Type is, in a sense, the road-going heir to the D-Type – a road
car that looks like a racer. Although unkindly called a ‘tart trap’ by some
at the time, it inherited the excellent aerodynamic performance of the D-
Type and offered 150mph performance for half the price of a Ferrari or an
Aston Martin. The E-Type was a true cut-price supercar – a 1960s British
icon offering great looks and authentic engineering.
A true cut-price supercar? The E-Type has sensuous bodywork and bulletproof engines. It made Jaguar a special brand.
However did such a terrific advantage slip away?
LAMBORGHINI 350 GTV
1963
When Ferruccio Lamborghini (1916–93) complained about shortcomings
in the Ferrari he had bought, Enzo Ferrari (1898–1988) is said to have
remarked, ‘What does a tractor manufacturer know about sports cars?’
True or not, Ferrari road cars at that time, for all their speed, were
doubtless carelessly made in many respects, and have even been
referred to simply as ‘a cynical way to finance the racing team’.
Lamborghini, on the other hand, went on to show that he knew a thing or
two about cars.
An industrialist and tractor-building millionaire, Lamborghini, took on
the task of creating a ‘supercar’ with immense seriousness, building an
impressive new factory and assembling a strong design and development
team from the incredible network of high-performance car experts that
northern Italy had on offer.
The fabulous Lamborghini V12 engine, both sculptural and effective,
was the work of Giotto Bizzarrini (1926–), who had formerly worked at
Ferrari, though some reports, perhaps mischievously, suggested a
consultancy involvement from Honda. However, when the car was first
shown at the 1963 Turin Motor Show, the engine had not yet been
installed, so Lamborghini apologized for not being able to open the door
or hood, exclaiming, ‘My mechanic has forgotten the keys, the cretino!’
The styling of this first model was entrusted to former Bertone
designer Franco Scaglione (1916–93) and was a little odd, the front end
reflecting, perhaps, the Chevrolet Corvette Sting Ray. Even a loyal
company history admits that ‘approval of its styling was by no means
unanimous’. But on the road the 350 was really good and, cleaned up
stylistically by Touring of Milan, allowed Lamborghini to do what many
have tried but few have achieved – to create an enduring new supercar
brand.
 Too futuristic? Too American? Too odd? The new Lamborghini 350 GTV with body by Franco Scaglione, launched in
October 1963, didn’t cut it. But the bones of the car were good and Touring of Milan transformed it into a credible GT car
that marked the birth of the brand.
FORD GT40
1964
Did Henry Ford II (1917–87) decide to go sports car racing and beat
Ferrari out of pique, when Enzo Ferrari (1898–1988) pulled back from a
deal to sell out to the Americans in 1963? Ford certainly seemed to have
regarded control of his racing teams as a plum part of the deal, for the
ultimate sticking point, Ferrari recalled, was Ford’s desire to control the
whole race programme and leave him no discretion to spend anything
over $10,000 without reference to Detroit.
Whatever the motivation, Ford decided that winning Le Mans, the
world’s preeminent sports car race, was a prestige worth investing in and
the GT40 programme was set up by top executive Lee Iacocca explicitly
to do this. Ford reached outside the company to set up a group full of
talent and race experience with Eric Broadley (1928–), founder of Lola
Cars and one of the great generation of British race car engineers that
also produced Colin Chapman of Lotus. Veteran US racer and car builder
Carroll Shelby (1923–) was also hired, along with former Aston Martin
race team manager John Wyer (1909–89). The first cars were based on
the Lola GT, which also used a beefy Ford eight-cylinder motor and were
British-built.
Although the GT40 first raced in 1964, it did not win at Le Mans until
1966, but it then went on to win and beat Ferrari four times in a row – a
feat that seemed extraordinary at the time. In 2004, under the influence
of design chief J Mays (1954–), Ford produced the GT – a re-engineered
homage to the GT40 as part of his ‘Retrofuturism’ programme. It is a fine
car but not as beautiful as the original. The extra three inches of height,
needed today to make it a practical road car, give a surprising impression
of added bulk. Sometimes, it seems, you just can’t go back.

After Ford’s victories, team manager John Wyer took over the GT40s and ran them with Gulf Oil sponsorship, winning Le
Mans twice (1968 and 1969) with the same car.
 Mans twice (1968 and 1969) with the same car.

Gold Cup Oulton Park, Cheshire, 1967. Ford could not have beaten Ferrari at Le Mans alone – it recruited racing
professionals from the UK and United States to the programme to ensure success.
CHEVROLET CORVAIR
1965
When US consumer Ralph Nader published his revolutionary attack on
the auto industry Unsafe at Any Speed in 1965, his list of unsafe cars led
with the Corvair, singled out for its known record of often-fatal ‘single
vehicle’ accidents. Compounding the corporate irresponsibility evident in
the design itself, Nader argued, was General Motors’s private knowledge
of the car’s handling problems. He claimed that, for several wasted years,
the company had refused to acknowledge the problem, instead blaming
driver error, and had thus delayed installing vital suspension
modifications.
Ironically, the Corvair had initially been launched to great acclaim – as
a mid-sized compact alternative to the large US sedans that could win
back sales from imported cars. The architecture of the Corvair was
influenced by GM chief engineer Edward Coles’s admiration for the VW
Beetle. Like the Beetle, the larger and sportier Corvair had a rear air-
cooled engine and swing axles – a cheap form of independent rear
suspension. Together, these brought the same treacherous handling
characteristics of the Beetle, though the Corvair was a much faster and
therefore also a much more dangerous car. In tight, fast bends, the
wheels would tuck under the car, reducing rubber contact, and the
engine-heavy rear would swing round ‘like a hammer on a string’, leaving
the driver powerless to control it.
Between them, Nader and the Corvair launched consumerism and
changed for ever the relationship between customer and manufacturer.
It all started out so well. The Corvair had lots going for it – sharper styling, smaller size, but the Volkswagen-influenced
rear engine brought a sting in the tail.
LAMBORGHINI MIURA
1965
There was a moment in the history of the world when a rock drummer, or
an Italian air-conditioning millionaire, could leave home scrunching the
gravel on his oval drive, put in some psychedelically mind-warping high-
speed kilometres, and scrunch up another oval drive in Monaco, Mentone
or St Moritz. For the purpose, the world’s best automotive engineers
created the perfect instrument for the connoisseur driver, a mid-engined
car that obediently rewarded every input and intention. Unleashing four
litres of bellowing Italian performance engineering, inches behind your
neck, and guzzling fuel through a dozen massive Bologna-built Weber
carburettor barrels, seemed an almost blameless act in an age before
issues of global warming came to light. The oval drives were important
because the rear view in the Lamborghini Miura was awful and reversing
a nightmare.
As part of the bid to outdo Ferrari in a true super-sports car,
Lamborghini set out to use race technology and solutions to create the
preeminent road-going GT car. The body followed the pattern of the
Ford/Lola GT40, being an integrated structural monocoque. The mid-
engine solution came from contemporary sports car racing, to give
perfect balance, and the race-bred independent suspension was as
smart and faithful as you could get.
All this would have counted for little if the car had been ugly but,
remarkably, it had the attention of the two best design talents in the
business. Giorgetto Giugiaro (1938–) had recently left Bertone, the
design consultancy that was developing the body shape for the new
Lamborghini, leaving a new mid-engined project on the stocks, but his
successor, Marcello Gandini, finished it and turned it into the Miura.
Particularly striking is the way the swelling of the rear wing (fender)
echoes that of the front, like waves in the sea, and just as the Cisitalia set
the form for sports cars for decades, so did the Miura for the new mid-
engined layout – echoes of it were evident in the Ferrari Dino and even
the more recent Lotus Elise.
The Miura set a new classical standard for the mid-engined performance car in the way Cisitalia had done earlier for front-
engined sports cars.
NSU RO 80
1967
The NSU Ro 80 represents a failed revolution. The new engine concept
unveiled by the unusual engineer Felix Wankel (1902–88) in 1954 was a
response to an ancient ambition among inventors to create an ‘ideal’
smooth rotary engine without up-and-down piston movement. Wankel
sold the concept to the German NSU company, which then used it to
build both motorcycles and small cars.
Wankel considered himself the third in a line of great German internal
combustion engineers, following Nikolaus Otto (1832–91) and Rudolf
Diesel (1858–1913). Surprisingly, though, he was not interested in close
collaboration with NSU – once it had bought his patents – and remained
aloof as it began to turn the invention into a practical thing.
The Wankel engine was turbine-smooth and looked, to many, like the
future. NSU entered into manufacturing agreements with car companies
around the world, including General Motors and Citroën (GM committed a
reported $50 million to its licence). NSU showcased the new motor in the
Ro 80 – a new mid-to luxury-level saloon. Voted ‘Car of the Year’ by
motoring writers, it was highly advanced in conception and performed
beautifully in every way. However, the engines, which had worked well in
prototype testing, failed so often in service that German Ro 80 drivers
used to hold up one, two or three fingers when passing each other to
show how many engines they’d had under guarantee.
Eventually, the company gave up the unequal struggle and the NSU
name was allowed to fade, out of embarrassment perhaps, while the
partner Audi brand was reinstated. The Wankel may have proved a
disaster, but selling licences perhaps underpinned the success of Audi
today.
A marvellous car – shame about the engine. How the faults of the Wankel motor escaped detection in prototype testing is
one of the enduring mysteries of automotive history.
BERTONE CARABO SHOW CAR
1968
The Italian Marcello Gandini (1938–) remains one of the most
extraordinary talents in the world of car design. He followed Giorgetto
Giugiaro (1938–) as chief designer at Bertone and, with the completion of
the Lamborghini Miura, showed that he could work in a ‘studio’ style – the
Miura follows closely the language that Giugiaro had established at
Bertone with the Corvair Testudo and Alfa Romeo-based Canguro.
Gandini’s subsequent design experiments, however, revealed a quite
new aesthetic language with concept cars such as the original Stratos
and the Carabo. These cars broke with the classic postwar Italian line
established by the Cisitalia. They did not reference existing or historic
trends but sprang into a new aesthetic world looking, it was once said,
‘like they had just landed – and on the wrong planet’.
The Carabo is clearly a step towards the Lamborghini Countach that
Gandini was soon to design. Even his great professional rival, Giugiaro,
called him ‘unbeatable at creating way-out sport cars with overpowering
aggression: some of his coupés seem to bite the ground even when they
are standing still’. But though aggression in cars now seems both
delinquent and old-fashioned, the Carabo and the Countach should still
be relished as kinetic sculptures from another age.
The Carabo illustrates the unparalleled imagination that Marcello Gandini deployed to reinvent the supercar. He went on to
extend this theme to the Lamborghini Countach.
RANGE ROVER
1970
Almost from the inception of the Land Rover, brothers Spencer (1891–
1991) and Maurice (1904–63) Wilks, who ran Rover, considered making
a more civilized vehicle with high standards of ride, quietness and
performance on the road – qualities that the sluggish but dependable
Land Rover lacked.
During the 1950s two unlovely prototype ‘Road Rovers’ were
developed but the idea did not progress until Charles Spencer (‘Spen’)
King (1925–) took up the project. King was a former Rolls-Royce
engineer and nephew of the Wilks brothers. The challenge, he saw, was
to produce a new product that could be tooled up ‘for hardly anything at
all … engineered from nothing’. King laid out the basic architecture of the
car, while Rover exterior designer David Bache (1925–94) did a
restrained and intelligent job on the exterior.
The new vehicle was also to have excellent off-road performance, and
King pioneered both full-time four-wheel drive and extremely soft, long-
travel suspension. Until then, Land Rovers and imitators had used hard
but durable springing. This compliant suspension was a new (and better)
solution for off-road vehicles and the Range Rover has consistently
remained best in its class for off-road work.
Although Spen King later regretted the transmutation of off-road sport-
utility vehicles (SUVs) into status symbols for city centres, his Range
Rover established a new, popular vehicle segment. But its success
prompts the question as to why inspired products, committed engineers
like the Wilks brothers and a talented successor in King were unable to
create and sustain the type of industrial auto dynasties that the Porsche
and Piëch families achieved in Germany. It’s hard to resist the conclusion
that, by the 1970s, the milieu in Britain was just too antithetical to
industry.
The world at its feet. The Range Rover was the original and best on-road/off-road 4X4.
ALFASUD
1971
Rudolf Hruska (1915–95) was one of the most engaging and talented ‘car
men’ in the postwar Italian scene. Austrian-born, he had joined Ferdinand
Porsche’s bureau in 1938 as a design engineer and helped with design
and production planning for the new Volkswagen. At the end of the war,
he was cut off in Italy, working with Officine Meccaniche (OM) on a
Porsche-designed tractor, but through racing contacts such as Tazio
Nuvolari he found his way to Cisitalia and became woven into the fabric
of the Italian motor industry. By 1951 he was consulting for Alfa Romeo.
After a spell with Fiat he shouldered the task of creating a new popular
Alfa Romeo as well as the factory to make it – at Pomigliano d’Arco, near
Naples. In part the project was intended by the government to encourage
employment in southern Italy, though Alfa Romeo also considered that
the company was reaching the limit of the labour force available in Milan.
For the Alfasud, Hruska used a flat-4 ‘boxer’ engine, which he liked
from his Volkswagen experience for its flat profile. To design the body he
brought in Giorgetto Giugiaro (1938–) for what was to be his first mass-
market success and which established Italdesign in its current premises
in Moncalieri, Turin. The car itself was delightful, being marred only by
poor corrosion performance in northern countries. However, the
production record of the car was low, running at about 50 per cent of the
target. As in the UK and elsewhere, transplanting car production to
provide employment proved tricky.
Pretty, practical and a joy to drive, the ’Sud was let down only by the enthusiasm with which the shell turned to rust. The
job confirmed Giorgetto Giugiaro as a major independent designer for the industry.
AUSTIN ALLEGRO
1973
By the mid-1960s the finances of the British Motor Corporation were
crumbling and the company needed serial government bailouts. To prime
minister Harold Wilson and industry minister Tony Benn, a merger with
the Leyland truck and bus company, led by the dynamic ‘super export
salesman’ Donald Stokes (1914–2008), seemed the way ahead. In fact,
the new Stokes empire swept up almost all the UK makers including
Jaguar, Triumph, Daimler and Rover, along with the BMC conglomerate
(chiefly comprising Austin and Morris brands), in an attempt to bring
order and rationality to the ailing UK car industry.
The Allegro was a much-needed attempt to bring in a new mid-sized
car by radically updating Issigonis’s excellent, but now ageing
Austin/Morris 1100, which was losing sales badly to the Ford Cortina.
With Alec Issigonis sidelined, newly imported ex-Ford designer Harris
Mann (1937–) drew up a decent and fresh-looking replacement, but the
process of internal engineering negotiations soon pulled the concept
apart.
The final result was lacklustre in appearance but dynamically not bad
– though inferior to the 1100, thanks to engineering compromises on the
suspension. Its novel, squared-off steering wheel, promoted as the
‘Quartic’ wheel, was seized on by journalists as a symbol of the futile
exercise in innovation that typified the car.
Overall, the Stokes programme failed to rationalize the UK car sector
with its many overlapping models, engine producers and supplier lines.
The postwar dispensation in which government industry ministries had
given both broad direction and major national investment to companies
was fading away, while labour relations were almost uniformly awful, with
the Longbridge Austin plant sometimes suffering three or four separate
strikes in a day. Perhaps no one could have reshaped this crumbling
archipelago, but the Allegro, in particular, has been called ‘the vital
stumble’.
Poor old Allegro. Its general proportions were not all that different from those of the Alfasud (see pages 86–7), which
everybody liked, showing just how subtle and challenging car design is.
VW GOLF
1974
During the 1960s and 1970s Volkswagen tried desperately to find
successor products to the enormously popular Beetle. The Fastback
estate car (also called the Variant) was only a limited success and it
amplified the potentially dangerous handling qualities of the VW rear-
engine set-up in a faster car. The front-engined, but lacklustre, K70
saloon, taken over from an NSU design, also achieved only modest sales
and it seemed hard to switch existing VW fans from their loyalty to the
quirky Beetle or to win new customers for newer, more conventional
designs.
Bringing in Giorgetto Giugiaro (1938–) was an inspired move in
breaking out of this impasse. Giugiaro had just made a great success of
the Alfasud, which showed he was not only a master at designing
beautiful, fantastical sports cars, but also soundly practical mass-market
saloons. However, also crucial to his success with the Golf, and indeed to
the entire success of Italdesign, was partner Aldo Mantovani (1927–), a
deeply experienced body engineer who had spent 19 years at Fiat with
legendary engineer Dante Giacosa (1905–96) during the postwar boom
years when Fiat was leading the way in production design. Thanks to
Mantovani’s involvement, Italdesign did not offer just exterior and interior
designs, but a highly integrated engineering package that specified how
the car was to be built, the design of the tooling, and a complete
schedule for production.
The new Golf (initially sold as the Rabbit in the United States) was the
complete antithesis of the Beetle. Gone were the baroque aerodynamics
and curves, replaced by a crisp, fresh, geometric form around a ‘post-
Issigonis’ ‘super-mini’ architecture. In one bound VW was free from the
albatross of the ageing ‘people’s car’ tag. The Golf was a hit from the
outset, becoming VW’s most important single product and the lynchpin of
its rise to become Europe’s number-one carmaker. Though modernized
and reinvented several times since then, VW understands that the Golf’s
continuing evolution is a balancing act between the familiar and the
novel, and each version still pays homage to Giugiaro’s design invention.

Crisp and almost perfect for the purpose. Giorgetto Giugiaro’s original Golf let Volkswagen throw off the shackles of the
quirky Beetle.
BMW 3 SERIES
1975
The progress of BMW has been, so far, an almost exemplary tale of
brand development. The key to its present identity can quite clearly be
found in the work of Giovanni Michelotti (1921–80), one of the most
important, though lesser-known, figures in the Turin car design world.
By the early 1960s BMW production was split between expensive
cars, nicknamed ‘Baroque Angels’ (Barockengel) on account of their
florid, retro looks, and diminutive economy ‘bubble’ cars, which were
based on the Italian Isetta design that BMW had licensed. BMW then
tried mid-sized projects, which came of age with the handsome 1962
Neue Klasse 1500 series for which Michelotti provided the characteristic
geometrical architecture and ‘kidney grille’ front end. These have
remained the hallmarks of the brand ever since. Indeed, each new
iteration of the 3 and 5 Series cars can be seen as a step in a
progressive though quite gentle morphing (usually by lowering and
rounding) of the essential Michelotti form.
Intriguingly, Michelotti deployed very similar language in his work for
Triumph with the 1300 and Dolomite. But though these cars were
attractive and widely admired, Triumph seemed not to have the quality
and industrial consistency to equal BMW and it became part of the
catastrophic decline of British Leyland and the UK car industry.
BMW epitomizes a particular pattern of ‘vertical’ brand development in which every model respects a clear family
architecture. The 3 Series is the German company’s most important product line.
LANCIA MEGAGAMMA
1978
‘He really is a star – for the one-designer car, probably the best in the
world right now.’ History has not reversed this judgment on Giorgetto
Giugiaro (1938–) , from Ghia studio boss Filippo Sapino, for Giugiaro
proved that he was able to move from the world of high-concept show
cars and feline supersports forms to designing and redefining the
architecture of popular cars.
We are used now to ‘people carriers’, or MPVs, but when Giugiaro
introduced the Megagamma in 1978 at the Turin Motor Show it was
genuinely a new vehicle type. With this vehicle Giugiaro was the first to
experiment with reversing the trend towards lowness and sportiness,
realizing that increased height allows a different seat angle and improved
roominess in small vehicles (a theme he later exploited with the Fiat
Uno). Lancia/Fiat were not confident enough about sales to produce it,
but homages to Giugiaro’s concept such as the Nissan Prairie and
Renault Espace were soon followed by similar offerings from most other
makers, establishing this as one of the most popular vehicle types for
family use today.
Giorgetto Giugiaro pioneered the move back to higher cars with the 1978 Megagamma and paved the way for MPVs and
‘people carriers’.
MAZDA RX7
1978
The invention of the Wankel rotary triggered a gold rush among the
world’s automakers to acquire licences (see pages 80–81). Was the new
Wankel rotary engine destined to be the future for personal transportation
– or, as Chrysler’s engineering boss Alan Loofbourrow predicted, would it
turn out to be ‘one of the most unbelievable fantasies ever to hit the world
auto industry’?
General Motors saw it as the way ahead and thought so much of its
new industrial secret that it cautioned, ‘careless disclosure is detrimental,
not only to the corporation, but to … the employees themselves in a
direct and personal way’. However, climbing oil prices and concern about
emissions soon caused GM to drop the project, while NSU’s pioneering
Wankel Ro 80 car ran into deep trouble in Germany with serial engine
failure caused by the compression seals of its units.
However, Toyo Kogyo (today Mazda) in Japan, alone among
carmakers, kept to the belief that the Wankel could make a viable rotary
engine through painstaking development. Even so, its researchers were
sorely tried. ‘Our top management courageously adopted a courageous
mentality’ was the very Japanese comment from chief engineer Kenichi
Yamamoto on the years of trouble during which ‘it was necessary to try
out every possible material available on this earth’.
The culmination of this perseverance was the RX7 – reliable, fast and
uncannily smooth, but also a curious comment on the nature of
technological successions. Yet the Wankel cannot be written off, for
social needs change and so do fuels. Mazda claim that its motor can
burn hydrogen more efficiently and safely than regular piston engines,
while not requiring the rare catalysts needed to use hydrogen in a fuel
cell.
Like a Galapagos turtle, the Mazda rotary-engined car has been pursuing its own lonely and particular development. Only
time will show if it is an evolutionary dead end.
AUDI 100
1983
The creation of Audi as a premium German car brand is one of the great
industrial achievements of the post-World War II era. In 1965 Auto Union,
now based in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, revived the prewar Audi name, though
shortly afterwards the group was bought by Volkswagen. In 1969 this
group merged with NSU (forming Audi NSU Auto Union AG), and Audi
was moved steadily upmarket, becoming the premium brand for the
group and a name that would come to rival BMW and Mercedes. Through
the 1970s and 1980s Audi would be steered largely by Ferdinand Piëch
(1937–), whose judgment and instincts proved almost flawless. Piëch, of
course, is a grandson of Ferdinand Porsche and grew up steeped in ‘car
culture’.
Design has been integral to the success of Audi and was directed at
Ingolstadt by Hartmut Warkuss – an exceptional design director and
manager who knew how to make the best use of many talented younger
designers (including ex-Royal College of Art graduates Martin Smith and
Peter Schreyer). The design department was also integrated very
cleverly with the engineering department and together they worked to
ensure that every model had a new technical edge, for Audi explicitly
noted that Germany’s high labour and social costs made the cars
expensive, ‘so we have to justify the price with excellent technology’. One
such feature was full-time four-wheel drive in a saloon car (a first for
series production). Another was the body development that made the
renewed Audi 100 one of the most aerodynamically efficient full saloon
cars on the market, with a drag coefficient of 0.30 – still a good figure
today.
The rebirth of Audi in the teeth of competition from existing high-end German brands was a brilliant achievement. Audi
sought always to give each model a particular technical edge.
TOYOTA PRIUS
1997
The Prius shows an extraordinary commitment to a new technology from
a major manufacturer, Toyota. There seems little doubt that it was the
personal conviction of Dr Shoichiro Toyoda, president of the company,
that drove this, for he is on record as stating, some time before such
views became commonplace, that CO2 emissions and global warming
were the greatest problems facing mankind.
The hybrid-drive Prius uses a petrol (gasoline) engine plus two electric
motors/generators and a substantial battery pack to allow it to run with
electrical or engine power, or any proportion of both. Efficiency
advantages come from the fact that the petrol engine only drives the road
wheels via the electrical system and therefore always runs at its most
efficient speed and power setting. Thus it never needs to run inefficiently
at low speed or small throttle openings. Moreover, under deceleration the
motors then function as dynamos, recovering kinetic energy and
producing electrical power to charge the batteries. The efficiency of this
set-up is a matter of ongoing debate.
The Prius performs well for fuel economy, but some users and
reviewers suggest that a simple and efficient diesel engine will beat the
more complex Prius on both consumption and on emissions, particularly
when whole-life ‘cradle to grave’ build and disposal costs are compared.
However, hybrid technology is new and constantly improving.
There is no doubt that the Prius is a technological tour de force,
though its great success in locations such as London and California has
been helped by favourable tax or charging regimes.
The hybrid petrol–electric power plant is one route to an efficient car with low emissions. Toyota has made a brave and
committed move to this new architecture.
FIAT MULTIPLA
1998
The original Multipla was a joyous device conceived in 1956 by the
incomparable Dante Giacosa (1905–96) to make an estate car out of his
new Fiat 600. The rear-engine layout made this quite a trick, but Giacosa
came up with a completely new vehicle type with three rows of seats,
perfect for many families of modest means, and thereby anticipated the
new typology of ‘people carriers’ by more than 20 years.
The new Multipla completely reversed this idea. By the 1990s long
three-row ‘van’-type people carriers were commonplace, so the challenge
from Paolo Cantarella – at the time managing director of Fiat Auto – was
to accommodate six people in comfort in a new short car under 4m (13ft)
long.
Designer Roberto Giolito and his team came up with a unique variant
– a wide vehicle accommodating three seats in the front and three
behind. The two-row layout gave a far more congenial interior for some
user groups, as well as a driving experience that was far superior to that
of its van-like rivals.
Unfortunately, the intriguing ‘frog face’ front end repelled many people
and earned it the ‘Ugliest Car’ award from the BBC’s Top Gear in 1999,
though the same programme also voted it ‘Car of the Year’ in 2000.
Perhaps the lesson of this episode is that public expectations can be led
gently to accept surprising new shapes, as Patrick Le Quément has
shown at Renault. Fiat may have surprised the market too much with this
daring new shape, but the Multipla is nonetheless destined to be a future
automobile classic.
The frog-faced Multipla with 3+3 seating was a clever design invention. Too bad that Fiat did not signal the arrival of the
new shape with hints in earlier cars.
NISSAN CUBE
1998
Nissan is unusual in that it does not attempt a coherent and unifying
visual identity across its range, proving that it is possible to break the
rules of ‘brand management’ as exemplified by BMW and Mercedes.
Each Nissan model appears to be a unique attempt to address a specific
sector and conforms to its own aesthetic rules.
Although Nissan (formerly Datsun) spearheaded the Japanese
invasion of Western markets, it later ran into problems until it was able to
form a surprising association with Renault, acquiring Carlos Ghosn as
President. Ghosn quickly headhunted Shiro Nakamura (1950–) from
Isuzu as design director, a man who came with his own explicit agenda to
base new designs on Japanese culture. Nakamura believes that ‘Japan
has centuries of tradition in the ability to combine an object’s function and
beauty in the best possible way, and the most interesting aspect is that
this is reflected in extremely simple lines.’
The Cube, developed following these precepts by design leader
Satoru Tai, is intended to reference a Japanese aesthetic through its use
of straight lines and right angles, but it also signals a new maturity in
urban car design and use. If speeds are slow, aerodynamics and sporty
looks become irrelevant. Habitability and the congeniality of the internal
space become more important and cars can become ‘unashamedly
cubic’. The extra height also contributes significantly to roominess, as
Giorgetto Giugiaro (1938–) had demonstrated with his Megagamma back
in 1978.
The end of the sports car? The Cube reinvents design aesthetics, looking at city life today and arguing that, if speeds are
low, roominess is much more important than aerodynamics.
SMART
1998
During the 1980s Nicolas Hayek (1928–), as chief executive of the
conglomerate Swatch Group, reformed the sprawling Swiss watch
industry, restoring profit and a sense of desirability to both premium
brands and its popular Swatch range. The spearhead of the campaign
was the creation of the Swatch watch itself as an affordable, ever-
changing fashion brand, made by highly integrated computer design and
manufacturing techniques.
Hayek also envisioned a low-cost micro car as a new Swatch product.
This would be built in a fresh way to preserve the virtuous Swatch high-
speed link from a fermenting graphic and general design department to
the production line, spawning an infinitely refreshed range of visually
cheeky personal cars, powered, moreover, by an eco-friendly electric or
hybrid power source.
An early association with Volkswagen did not work out so in 1994
Swatch and Mercedes-Benz teamed up to build the car. The low cost for
the product expected by Hayek proved hubristic, for the mainstream auto
industry has had decades of experience of driving down the cost of a
complex product to an absurdly low level. There were really no new ways
to reduce the cost below that of a conventional Panda-or Polo-sized car.
Since the introduction of the Smart, Mercedes-Benz is considered to
have lost some $4 billion in the venture. However, it still hopes the range
will become profitable and it has achieved something useful by inserting
a new micro car type into the traffic ecology of cities. In some ways Smart
has paid the penalty of going first – both Fiat’s new 500 and Toyota’s IQ
show that those companies also believe there is now potential in this new
sub-Mini sector.
 The arrival of the Smart is welcome, in the face of the almost irresistible growth in the bulk and weight of personal
vehicles. However, it is unlikely that Mercedes-Benz will recover the huge investment that it has taken to install the Smart
in our consciousness.
Figures in italics indicate captions.
Adler 20
Alfa Romeo 30, 30, 36, 46, 48, 48, 86
Alfa Romeo Portello works 48
Alfa Romeo-based Conguro 82
Alfasud 86, 86, 90
Aluminium Français 52
Amilcar 16
Anderloni, Felice Bianchi 30
argon-arc aluminium welding 70
Aston Martin 30, 70, 74
Audi 80, 96, 98, 98
Austin 64, 86
1100 64
Allegro 86, 86
FX4 taxi 58, 58
Seven 12, 12
TX4 58
Austin, Herbert 12, 12
Auto Union, Ingolstadt, Bavaria 98
Bache, David 84
Bailey, Eric 58
Barthes, Roland 54
BBC Top Gear 102
Benn, Tony 86
Bentley 70
Bertone 30, 48, 72, 78
BAT 46, 46
Carabo show car 82, 82
Stratos 82
Bertone, Flaminio 54, 54
Bertone, Giuseppe ‘Nuccio’ 46, 48
Bizzarrini, Giotto 72
BMW 28, 30, 92, 98, 104
3 Series 92, 92
5 Series 92
‘Baroque Angels’ (Barockengel) 92
BMW 328 28, 28
Neue Klasse 1550 series 92
Boano, Mario 48
Boulanger, Pierre-Jules 42, 54
Bristol 28, 28, 30
British Aeroplane Company 70
British leyland 92
British Motor Corporation (BMC) 64, 86
Broadley, Eric 74
Brooklands 10, 16
Buckminster Fuller, Richard 20, 20
Buckower Dreieck 14
Bugatti 14, 14, 24, 24
Bugatti, Carlo 14
Bugatti, Ettore 14, 24
Bugatti, Jean 24, 24
Buick
LeSabre concept car 44, 44
Burzi, Dick 58
Cantarella, Paolo 102
Carrozzeria Touring 30
Castel Furano 50
Chapman, Colin 60, 74
chassis, rigid box section 28
Chevrolet
Corvair 76, 76
Corvette Sting Ray 72
‘chevron’ gears 22
Chicago World Exposition (1933) 20
Chiswick, west London 16
Chrysler 50, 96
Cisitalia 30, 32, 78, 78, 86
Berlinetta 32, 32
Citroën 52, 80
2CV 42, 42, 68
Ami 68, 68
DS 54, 54, 68
Traction Avant 18, 22, 22
Citroën, André 22, 42
CO2 emissions 100, 100
Coles, Edward 76
Colombo, Gioachino 36
computer-modelling techniques 44
concept cars 44
Continental Alpine Trials 28
Corvair Testudo 82
Corvette 56
Costin, Frank 60
Coventry Climax engine 60, 60
cyclecar 10, 12
Daimler-Benz 86, 106
D’Ascanio, Corradino 40
Datsun 104
Davenport, Basil 10, 10
de Havilland 60
Delage 24
Delahaye 24
Design Museum 6
Diesel, Rudolf 80
diesel engine 100
disc brakes 60
DKW 62, 66
dog clutches 10
Duncan, Isadora 16
Duroplast 62
Dusio, Piero 32
Dymaxion 20, 20
Earl, Harley 44, 44
Edward G. Budd Company of Philadelphia 22
eight-cylinder engine 14, 26, 36, 74
electrical equipment 34
Enlightenment 8
ERA six-cylinder machine 36
Farina, Battista ‘Pinin’ 32
Fenaille, Pierre 18
Ferguson, Adam 8
Ferrari 32, 36, 60, 70, 72, 74, 74, 78
Ferrari, Enzo 36, 74
Ferrari Maranello factory 36
Fiat 32, 90
500 106
600 56, 56, 102
Auto 102
Multipla 102, 102
Nuova 500
Panda 106
Turbina 50, 50
Uno 94
flat-4 ‘boxer’ engine 86
Ford 66
Cortina 86
GT 74
GT 40 74, 74
Model T 8, 8
Ford, Henry 8, 22
Ford, Henry, II 74, 74
Fordism 8
Formula One design 12, 60
four-cylinder engine 12, 68
four-stroke motor 66
four-wheel brakes 26
four-wheel drive 84, 98
Frazer Nash cars 10, 28
Frazer-Nash, Archibald 10, 10
front engine 20
front-wheel drive 18, 20, 22, 22, 64, 66
Gandini, Marcello 46, 82, 82
gas turbine 50
gearbox, integrated 64
General Motors (GM) 44, 44, 80, 96
Ghosn, Carlos 104
Giacosa, Dante 56, 56, 90, 102
Giugiaro, Giorgetto 46, 78, 82, 86, 86, 90, 90, 94, 94, 104
global warming 78, 100
Godfrey, Ronald 10
Godfrey & Nash (GN) 10, 12
‘Spider’ 10, 10
Gold Cup Oulton Park, Cheshire 74
Grand Prix of Reggio Emilia 14
Grégoire, Jean-Albert 18, 52
Gropius, Walter 20
GT40 programme 74
Gulf Oil 74
Hassan, Walter 70
Hayek, Nicolas 106
headlamps 54
Heusser, H. 14
Highland Park factory (Ford) 8, 8
hill-climb ‘specials’ 10, 10
Hitler, Adolf 8, 34
Honda 72
Hruska, Rudolf 86
hybrid power 100, 100, 106
Iacocca, Lee 74
Isotta Fraschini 30
Issigonis, Alec 64, 64, 86
Italdesign, Moncalieri, Turin 86
‘Italian line’ 30, 32
Jaguar 6, 32, 70, 70, 86
Jano, Vittorio 36
Jaray, Paul 26, 34, 66
Jaray Streamline Carriage Company, Zurich 26
Jensen 30
Kahn, Albert 8
KdF-Wagen (Volkswagen) 26
‘kidney grille’ 92
King, Charles Spencer 84
Kirwan-Taylor, Peter 60
Lamborghini
350 GTV 72, 72
Countach 82, 82
Miura 78, 78, 82
V12 engine 72
Lamborghini, Ferruccio 72
Lampredi, Aurelio 36
Lancia
Aprilia 30
Megagamma 94, 94
Land Rover 38, 38, 84
Le Corbusier 6
Le Mans 16, 18, 30, 30, 32, 70, 74, 74
Le Quément, Patrick 102
Ledwinka, Hans 26
Lefèbvre, André 22, 42, 54
Levallois-Perret, Paris 16
Leyland truck and bus company 86
Lingotto rooftop track 50
Lola Cars 74
Lola GT 74
London ‘black cab’ 58, 58
London Motor Show (1948) 70
Longbridge Austin plant 86
Loofbourrow, Alan 96
Lord, Leonard 64
Lotus 60, 60, 74, 78
LTI 58
Lyons, William 70
Magès, Paul 54
Mann, Harris 86
Mantovani, Aldo 90
Maserati 36, 60
Maserati brothers 30
Mays, J 74
Mazda
MX-5 16
RX7 96, 96
Mercedes-Benz 98, 104, 106
MG 16
Michelin tyre company 42
Michelotti, Giovanni 92
mid-engined cars 78, 78
Mini 64, 64
Miramas circuit, southern France 16
Modernism 66
Molsheim factory, Alsace 14, 24
monocoque
glass-fibre 60
integrated structural 78
Monte Carlo Rally 66, 66
Monza 50
Morris 64, 86
Mors 22
Moss, Stirling 36
Moulon, Alex 64
Nader, Ralph: Unsafe at Any Speed 44
Nakamura, Shiro 104
Nash 58
Nervi, Pier Luigi 46
Nissan 104
Cube 104, 104
Prairie 94
S Cargo 6
NSU 98
Ro 80 car 80, 80, 96
Nuvolari, Tazio 86
off-road ‘trials’ 12
Offficine Meccanische (OM) 86
open tourers
Otto, Nikolaus 80
Panhard Dyna 52, 52
Paris Motor Show (1948) 42
‘people carriers’ 102
Petit, Emile 16
Piaggio Ape 40, 40
Piëch 84
Piëch, Ferdinand 98
Pininfarina 30, 32
Pomigliano d’Arco, near Naples 86
Porsche 26, 84
Porsche, Ferdinand 34, 86, 98
pressed-steel body 22, 22
Prinetti & Stucchi 14
production line 8
propeller shaft 26
Public Carriage Office, London 58, 58
‘Quartic’ wheel 86
racing cars 12
Range Rover 84, 84
Rapi, Luigi Fabio 50
rear engine 20, 26, 76, 90
rear-wheel drive 20
Renault 102, 104
Espace 94
‘Retrofuturism’ programme 74
Rolls-Royce 38, 84
Rome Grand Prix 50
Rover company 38, 50, 86
Saab 96 66, 66
‘safety bicycle’ 38
Salmson ‘San Sebastian’ 16, 16
Salomano, Carlo 50
Sapino, Filippo 94
Sason, Sixten 66
Sayer, Malcolm 70
Scaglione, Franco 46, 48, 72, 72
Schreyer, Peter 98
Segre, Luis 48
semiautomatic epicyclic transmission 8
Setright, L.J.K. 42
Shelby, Carroll 74
six-cylinder engine 28, 28, 70
Skegness, Lincolnshire 10
Smart 106, 106
Smith, Martin 98
Société des Automobiles Tracta 18
sports versions 12
Stalin, Joseph 8
Starley, John Kemp 38
Stokes, Donald 86
streamlining 24, 26
styling bridge 44
suspension
front 66
hydraulic suspension 54
independent 26, 60, 78
long-travel 84
Svensk Flygmotor 66
Swatch Group 106
swing axles 34
Tai, Satoru 104
Tatra 34
T87 26, 26
Topolino 56
Touring coachwork company, Milan 32, 72, 72
Touring Superleggera construction system 30
Toyo Kogyo (now Mazda) 96
Toyoda, Dr Shoichiro 100
Toyota
IQ 106
Prius 100, 100
Trabant 62, 62
Trabant Zwickau works 62
‘Trabbie’ (Trabant) 62
Tracta 18, 18, 52
transverse engine 64
Triumph 86
1300 92
Dolomite 92
trucks, light 40, 40
Turin Motor Show 46, 48, 72, 94
twelve-cylinder engine 36
twin-cam engine 16, 48
two-cylinder engine 10
two-stroke motor 62, 62
Übelacker, Erich 26
Vespa 40
Vintage Sports Car Club 10
Voisin, Gabriel 22
Volkswagen 26, 76, 86, 96, 106
Beetle 34, 34, 56, 76, 90
‘Fastback’ estate car (‘Variant’) 90
K70 saloon 90
Polo 106
VW Golf (Rabbit) 90, 90
Volkswagen Wolfsburg plant 34
Wankel, Felix 80
Wankel rotary engine 80, 80, 96
Warkuß, Hartmut 98
Weber carburettor barrels 78
Weslake, Harry 70
Whittle, Frank 38
Wilks, Maurice 38, 84
Wilks, Spencer 84
Willys Jeep 38
Wilson, Harold 86
Wyer, John 74, 74
XK engine 70
Yamamoto, Kenichi 96
Zeppelin 26, 34
PICTURE CREDITS

The publisher would like to thank the following contributors for their kind
permission to reproduce the following photographs:
2 Thierry Brisacque/Gamma/Eyedea/Camera Press London; 7 Jaguar
Daimler Heritage Trust; 9 Top Hulton Archive/Getty Images; 9 Bottom
Three Lions/Getty Images; 11 Top National Motor Museum/MPL; 11
Bottom FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images; 12-13 General Photographic
Agency/Getty Images; 14-15 akg-images; 16-17 Andrew Nahum Archive;
19 National Motor Museum/MPL; 20-21 Courtesy of The Estate of R.
Buckminster Fuller; 23 Citroen Communication; 24-25 Car Culture/Getty
Images; 26 National Motor Museum/MPL; 27 Kees Smit; 28-29 BMW AG;
30 Courtesy of Giovanni Bianchi Anderloni; 31 Alfa Romeo; 33 Top
National Motor Museum/MPL; 33 Bottom Jerry Cooke/Time Life
Pictures/Getty Images; 34 Hulton Archive/Getty Images; 35 akg-images;
36-37 Ferrari SpA; 39 Tif Hunter; 40-41 Piaggio; 42 Transtock Inc/Alamy;
43 Keystone-France/Camera Press; 45 Used with permission of General
Motors Media Archives/General Motors Corp.; 46-47 Bertone; 48-49 Alfa
Romeo; 50 National Motor Museum/MPL; 51 Fiat; 52 Andrew Nahum
Archive; 53 National Motor Museum/MPL; 55 Citroen Communication;
56-57 Fiat; 59 Malcolm/Hulton Archive/Getty Images; 61 Sutton
Motorsport Images/Heritage-Images; 62 akg-images; 63
Popperfoto/Getty Images; 64 British Motor Industry Heritage Trust; 65
BMW AG; 67 SAAB; 68-69 Citroen Communication; 71 Jaguar Daimler
Heritage Trust; 72 Car Culture/Getty Images; 73 Klemantaski
Collection/Getty Images; 74-75 Ford Motor Company; 77 Used with
permission of General Motors Media Archives/General Motors Corp.; 79
Tom Wood/Alamy; 80-81 Tif Hunter; 82 Andrew Nahum Archive; 83 Alfa
Romeo; 85 British Motor Industry Heritage Trust; 86-87 Alfa Romeo; 89
Keystone/Hulton Archives/Getty Images; 91 Volkswagen; 92-93BMW
AG; 94-95 Italdesign Giugiaro SpA; 97 Mazda; 98-99 Audi; 100-101
National Motor Museum/MPL; 102-103 Fiat; 104-105 Simon Clay/Alamy;
107 Lawrence Jackson/AP/PA Photos
Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders and we
apologise in advance for any unintentional errors or omissions, and
would be pleased to insert the appropriate acknowledgment in any
subsequent publication.
CREDITS

Text written by:

Andrew Nahum
Andrew Nahum is Principal Curator of Technology and Engineering at the
Science Museum, London and is a research tutor in the Department of
Vehicle Design at the Royal College of Art. He has written extensively on
the history of technology, aviation and transport for both scholarly and
popular journals.
First published in 2009 by Conran Octopus Ltd a part of Octopus
Publishing Group, Endeavour House, 189 Shaftesbury Avenue, London
WC2H 8JY
www.octopusbooks.co.uk
An Hachette Livre UK Company www.hachettelivre.co.uk.
This eBook first published in 2011 by Octopus Publishing Group Ltd.
Text copyright © Conran Octopus Ltd 2009
Design and layout copyright © Conran Octopus Ltd 2009
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or
otherwise, without the prior permission in writing of the Publisher.
Publisher:
Lorraine Dickey
Consultant Editor:
Deyan Sudjic
Managing Editor:
Sybella Marlow
Editor:
Robert Anderson
Art Director:
Jonathan Christie
Design:
Untitled
Picture Researcher:
Anne-Marie Hoines
Production Manager:
Katherine Hockley
Senior Production Controller:
Caroline Alberti
ISBN: 9781840915853
This eBook produced by Textech.