Giorgetto Giugiaro retires from automotive design

3 July, 2015

Italian designer Giorgetto Giugiaro has retired from automotive design at the age of 76. Known as one of history’s most influential car designers, Giugiaro penned cars for brands including Volkswagen, Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Lamborghini, BMW, and Bugatti. In 1999, Giugiaro was named Car Designer of the Century by the Global Automotive Elections Foundation, before going on to be inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in 2002.

In 1968, alongside Aldo Mantovani, Giugiaro founded the design and engineering company Italdesign Giugiaro. Little did the pairing know that their work would become revered worldwide. Giugiaro left Italdesign on the June 28, after the company’s final shares were sold to Audi.

Most well known for his work designing cars, Giugiaro designed many other things, including cameras for Nikon, guns, and even a form of pasta (well, he is Italian).

But, it will always be his cars that he will be best remembered for. Here’s five of his best.

5. 1981 DeLorean DMC-12

Most famous for its spot in the hit movie franchise Back to the Future, the DeLorean DMC-12 actually fell flat as a road car, with journalists labelling it slow and unreliable. But, its design, particularly its gull-wing doors have ensured that decades later, it still looks like something from the future.

4. 1977 BMW M1

The M1 remains BMW’s only mid-engined car to date, which is a shame, as its timeless looks are still relevant. Design cues from the M1 can still be seen in many of BMW’s current cars, including the recently launched i8.

3. 1995 Lamborghini Calà concept

Next to the majority of Lamborghinis, with their harsh lines and jagged angles, the Calà looks comparatively svelte and reserved. It was originally slated to replace the Lamborghini Jalpa, but was sadly shelved after the company was sold to Volkswagen Group in 1998.

2. 1984 Saab 9000

You know a design is good when it still looks fresh over a decade after its debut. This must have been Saab’s plan when they introduced the Saab 9000 in 1984, as the design hung around, largely without change, until 1998 — some 14 years later. Not just pretty, the 9000 also set the tone for Saab’s brand identity, with certain features remaining on their cars for years, until Saab Group’s ultimate demise in 2011.

1. 1974 Volkswagen Golf Mk1

Giugiaro’s Golf Mk1 helped lay the foundations for what would eventually become Volkswagen’s best-selling car. While the Golf was initially built as a replacement for the immortal Beetle, it would become a heroic car in its own right. It was, and remains, one of the most influential hatchback platforms ever made.

Janspeed recreates the Jaguar sports car

29 September, 2026

Thankfully, a few of these cars made it to New Zealand, the odd one being imported from the UK over the years. However, the 1988 British Racing Green example owned by Bill Slater in Upper Hutt was originally sold as a standard car but converted using the full Janspeed kit by the first owner within a couple of years of buying it.
Bill has owned a few other Jaguars. In fact, after he sold his Jaguar XJ12 in 2018, he found himself pining for another and, when the XJ-S came up for sale, he could not resist it. Having just sold the V12, he was not expecting much from the six-cylinder car other than more reliability and it being cheaper to keep on the road. Naturally, he had heard of the influence Janspeed had on the marque, but it was not until he took the car for a test drive that he became aware of just how superior it was to the car he had just sold. The price of a second-hand Janspeed XJ-S and that of a standard 3.6 XJ-S is quite comparable, making the Janspeed version an incredible bargain, even more so in comparison with other performance classic cars — or even modern cars, for that matter — which cost far more bucks for the bang.

The writing on the wall

25 September, 2026

Deven, a digital content producer in his 20s, says it was the rear-drive Nissan and Toyota drift cars that fired his imagination in his not-so-distant youth and soon had him wanting one of his own. However, like most of us, he had to start in something less glamorous – in his case, a 1997 Mitsubishi Galant. After that, he bought a four-litre V8 1991 Toyota Soarer, a big change from the Mitsubishi.
“It was my daily driver, and it wasn’t that bad to run back when petrol was affordable,” he says.
When he got fed up with filling it up, Deven bought a 1989 Ford Laser sedan, a 1.3-litre five-speed manual, to be his daily driver. It’s in very good condition, bought from a careful older driver, and he still runs it – although he will occasionally also drive the latest in a series of Nissan Laurel sedans. His current one, from 1993, has done the lowest number of kilometres yet, at 183,000. It has the single-cam version of the engine in his Skyline.
“I’ve had four different versions of that car. It was just a car I always liked. It’s really comfortable, quite luxurious. I bought it from a 90-year-old in Hamilton. It’s in mint condition, and everything is standard.”