Rehashing classic designs can seem cynical, but occasionally produces something sensational
A couple of separate but related events recently unfolded in the world of Monopoly-money cars. Bugatti revealed an impressive Chiron-based Veyron 2.0, while across the Atlantic, in Florida, somebody paid through the eyes, ears and nose for a 649-mile Enzo.
The Ferrari hit $18 million on the auction block and the Bugatti is a one-off costing “at least” €10m. Hugely different cars but ultimately the same itch scratched: nostalgia for the early noughties, with nostalgia increasingly becoming the new horsepower. Which route you’d take in a world where you’ve just pulled off a newsworthy white-collar crime is a great debate for the pub. Duplicate the past with the kinks ironed out or embrace authenticity?
The price paid for the Enzo is further evidence that we find there to be something irresistible about supercars of the early 2000s. They aren’t yet archaic, yet the purity of their designs and powertrains feels quite profound (see also the Porsche Carrera GT, Pagani Zonda and Ford GT). There’s also the strong feeling that they pushed the envelope at a time when the resulting car was extreme but still exploitable on the right road. And it was a time before social media’s saturation of the petrolhead space, when fresh flagship supercars generated genuine wonderment and a lengthy, meaningful media buzz. Halcyon days.
They’re calling the Bugatti the FKP Hommage in tribute to Ferdinand Piëch. Straight away you know it’s a success, because it makes you wonder if, 20 years ago, we unfairly maligned the Veyron from a design standpoint. It looks sensational. In fairness, I already had positive inclinations on the brain. An original Veyron buzzed me on the M40 last summer, passing with the extraterrestrial cool of a Tron light cycle. All curve and presence, stalking the outside lane very quickly indeed. Looks and mad speed aside, they’re surprisingly raw supercars. Plush but not aloof or boring on the move, as so many people assume.
Reputationally the Veyron has always suffered from Nissan GT-R syndrome. I still wouldn’t want an original Veyron, and I don’t suppose I’d warm to an Enzo revitalised in the style of the FKP Hommage. I can’t easily say why, but it’s funny how sensitive the balance is.
These kinds of projects either blow your socks off or sink, and what suits one car does not another. The possibility of making a dud hasn’t exactly stemmed the flow of these cars. The big dogs of the supercar landscape have long tapped into the bespoke approach but no longer is it simply a pearlescent paint job and sharkskin cockpit trim (a request from an Aventador customer that Lamborghini once had to delicately decline).
Clients often want something suggestive of times gone by, and strange contrivances abound as car makers attempt to trade on past glory. Some reinventions are entirely inoffensive, of course. Eric Clapton’s Ferrari SP12 EC recalled the 512 BB via the 458 Italia. I thought that was great. Pininfarina’s Enzo-based P4/5 for Jim Glickenhaus was fabulous too, perhaps because it took some aesthetic liberties when recreating the look of the 1967 330 P3/4.
It’s unwise to try to be too literal when reimagining, unless you really have the sensitivity to manage it, as in the case of the Bugatti FKP Hommage. On the other hand, Ferrari recently gave us the SC40: an overwrought F40-alike based on the 296 GTB. Lamborghini also revived the Countach a bit awkwardly with the LPI 800-4, resulting in a pissed-off Marcello Gandini. Neither worked, perhaps because they were just a bit artless and obvious.
Having now grasped at the low-hanging fruit, another attempt can’t easily be made again. Interestingly, back-catalogue aesthetic revival is more forgiving—easier to pull off—for lesser denizens of the car world. Think the Fiat 500, BMW’s Mini and notably the Renault 5, which went on sale last year. And let’s not forget the world’s pre-eminent performance car: the Porsche 911 is, stylistically speaking, a half-century exercise in flawless recursive evolution.
So it’s a complex topic, to which there is no rule of thumb. I don’t think you can be for or against such projects in totality. What I like is that the action is not isolated to the zillion-pound market, and neither does the end result need to be brand-homogenous.
Bertone has just revived the Runabout concept it styled for Autobianchi in 1969, on an S3 Lotus Exige base. Not cheap, but the idea and execution is true feelgood stuff, which is what we need as mainstream cars get more appliance-like. Nostalgia mining appears cynical but it can be so imaginative and exciting.
