Powered by a free-revving, 1.2-litre flat-four and equipped with disc brakes all round, the Alfa offered class-leading dynamics – but it was Giugiaro’s timeless styling that made it one of the prettiest small family cars of its day. At 21, he was headhunted by legendary designer and car builder Nuccio Bertone to join his coachworks (as a test exercise, Bertone set him the task of drawing a new Alfa Romeo: it was so good, Bertone eventually sold it to Alfa). As for the styling, that sharp-edged, dart-like profile offered an early hint at the direction Giugiaro’s work would take in the 1970s, but the long and almost impossibly low nose – combined with the squat roof and shapely tail – bestowed it with a truly timeless elegance that's still captivating today. Table of contents: The Fiat Dino proved that Giugiaro was equally as adept at wonderfully understated subtlety as he was at delivering jaw-dropping drama with his supercars. Through Italdesign, Giorgetto designed a huge number of mass-production cars, including popular models owned by brands such as Alfa Romeo, BMW, Ferrari, Ford, Lamborghini or Maserati. In its purest form, though, the rust-prone 'Sud – and its pretty coupé iteration, the Sprint – was a truly inspired design that Alfa would struggle to better. The Ghibli's 4.7-litre V8 provided massive low-end torque and remarkable refinement, as well as astonishing pace: the factory claimed a top speed of 174mph. He went on and on about the 50mm, and eventually one of the other men interrupted him. Bellissima: Giorgetto Giugiaro’s greatest car designs, © One car for functional things: if you want to go out with your friends you’ll drive a Jaguar or a BMW, or have an SUV to go to the mountains, and perhaps you might have an electric Rolls-Royce to rent for really special occasions. As a teenager, Giorgetto Giugiaro dreamt of being an artist. The engineers protested, but he reeled off more figures, and when they were checked, he was correct. That powerplant was in fact born of Ferrari's need for a small-capacity unit to comply with homologation requirements, and it gifted the pretty Fiat with an exquisite soundtrack. So the style will matter more, not less.”. Look, it’s all one single visual display unit that goes right across!”, In the two front seats, we look out at the white wall in front of us as if he might just start up the car and drive through it. Launched in 1971, the Alfasud represented a whole new direction for Alfa Romeo: not only was it the Italian firm’s first foray into the compact front-wheel-drive market, but the car would also be built at a state-sponsored factory near Naples – hence the name (sud is Italian for south). As a boy, Giugiaro wanted to be a painter, and he has painted portraits and landscapes all his life; on his 80th birthday he painted a series of four-metre panoramas used in a cycle of Passion Plays performed publicly in Garessio every four years. 1988 Italdesign AZTEC Concept Car designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro This model debuted at the Turin show as an innovative show car and the original prototype is now preserved eternally as a part of the Giugiaro Collection. Look, with the glass dome you have perfect visibility, because there are no pillars! For the 2005 Tokyo Motor Show, Giorgetto Giugiaro displayed a custom Ferrari fastback in celebration of his debut into the world of car design 50 years earlier. 1978 BMW M1: BMW’s limited-production homolgation special was the brands first M car, its first mid-engined vehicle, and a total outlier design-wise, but a looker nonetheless. In fact, he’s sceptical about most things people in marketing say, because he thinks men buy cars for psychological reasons marketeers cannot measure. Sign up to our newsletter to get more articles like this delivered straight to your inbox, Elon Musk’s Driverless Tesla Is Getting Netflix, Bond's New Aston Martin Is The Valhalla Supercar, The Coolest New Cars Coming Our Way In 2021, The Best Projectors For Movies, Gaming And Sport, The Smartest Gadgets a Man Can Buy in 2021. But it was the aggressive lines, penned during Giugiaro’s brief tenure at Ghia, that endowed it with the kind of crowd-pleasing drama that would soon become a prerequisite of every supercar worth its name. He was born in Garessio, Cuneo, Piedmont. Based on the Maserati Bora, the Boomerang was designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro and presented at the 1971 Turin Motor Show. Before starting his own consultancy, he worked in-house for Fiat, Bertone and, later, Ghia. With 0.65-litre or 0.9-litre engines available, the car was a hoot to drive – even with a choppy ride – and remains one of the great man's favourite designs. In 2010, Volkswagen took a big stake: by 2015, rumoured to be somewhat at odds with German management, Giugiaro walked — or presumably, drove — away. His cars pop up in fashionable media (for example, the Maserati Boomerang in Juergen Teller’s Louis Vuitton ads from 2014) as fans pay homage (the week before I visit, a German photographer couple had driven to visit him in their Fiat Panda, revered by some as a masterpiece of utilitarian design, so he could sign it).