Page 10 - Lancia Stratos Zero Sample pages

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The Making of the Lancia Stratos hf Zero
ARCHIVIO CENTRALE DELLO STATO/STILE BERTONE
convertibles. This shift may have been influenced by Alfa
with Fiat.
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With this rough, quick rendering Marcello Gandini was getting closer to the sculptural form that would eventually see the light of day.
Romeo’s close ties with Carrozzeria Bertone during the
1950s and 1960s. However, when Fiat acquired Lancia
in October 1969, Nuccio Bertone saw an opportunity to
rekindle the relationship, leveraging Bertone’s strong ties
“Yes, as Fiat had just acquired Lancia, Nuccio Bertone
saw an opportunity in that,” agreed Panicco, adding, “The
other reason was that Lancia had been passing through
difficult financial situations for several years. And yes,
they had been taken over by Fiat just earlier. After Nuccio
Bertone suggested Lancia, we wondered how we could
do it considering that the only interesting model it had
was the Fulvia coupé, with which it had won so many
rallies recently that it was doing very well. But then with
the power of the newer engines, the Fulvia coupé was
not capable of fighting Porsche, Alpine and the others.
So, what could we do?”
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“And that was when Gandini spoke up,” recounted
Panicco. “You know, he said very little, he hardly spoke.
But then he said, ‘Why don’t we make a mid-engine
Lancia?’ And we were all looking at him, and saying,
how can we make a mid-engine Lancia? ‘Well, we take a
coupé, and we make a mid-engine car,’ said Gandini. Then
Gandini added, ‘we have made the Miura, the Marzàl, the
Carabo and now we are working on the Urraco and the
Fiat X1/9. We are the only ones in the world to have done
so many mid-engine cars, why don’t we make a mid-
engine Lancia?’”
Panicco continued: “Nuccio Bertone was very pleased to
hear the possibility of doing such a thing. But then he said
‘If we say something, if we ask Lancia, the project will be
completely canceled. Not only will they not help us, but
they may also put a stop to the idea altogether’. To which
Gandini responded ‘We say nothing and do what we like.
We can buy a coupe and we will go to the Turin Motor
Show with a concept’.”
These may have been the orthogonal drawings of the first “bubble top” idea that Gandini had.
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