Carrozzeria Vignale

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Vignale

logo
legal form former company
founding 1946
Seat Turin , Italy
Branch Body shop , automotive design

Vignale company typeface as seen in catalogs from the 1960s

Vignale was an Italian automobile design and body construction company that existed from 1946 to 1974 and designed, produced and occasionally marketed exclusive bodies for numerous automobile manufacturers in a wide variety of categories .

history

The company was founded by Alfredo Vignale (1913-1969) in 1946 under the name Carozzeria Alfredo Vignale in Turin . Alfredo Vignale had already gained professional experience at the Stabilimenti Farina company (not to be confused with Pininfarina , once written separately as “Pinin Farina”) and now wanted to offer his own bodies . The majority of all cars built by Vignale, however, are designed by his personal friend and independent designer Giovanni Michelotti , with whom he always worked closely.

The first own body based on a Fiat 500 Topolino was produced in 1948, followed by a Fiat 1100 in a special version.

In the 1950s and 1960s, Vignale designed bodies on a technical basis that were considered to be shapely and elegant, among others for Fiat , Cisitalia , Ferrari , Lancia , Maserati , Alfa Romeo , BMW and for De Tomaso . Except for individual pieces and small series also were production cars karossiert, such as the Appia- and Flavia - Cabriolet and the Maserati 3500 Spider , Sebring I , II Sebring, Mexico , as well as compact cars such as the Daihatsu Compagno . Vignale built a few aluminum bodies, but most of his bodies were made of sheet steel .

For many years, the main business of Vignale was to produce small series of volume models as well as special versions of models from the well-known Italian automobile manufacturers. From the beginning to the end of the 1960s, various small series of sporty automobiles under the name Vignale were produced on various Fiat platforms such as the 600 , 850 and 1300/1500 , which in the case of the Fiat 600 and 850 were optionally available as attractive convertibles. Vignale also built a stylish four-door version of the Fiat 850 sedan. The attempt to establish one's own brand in the long term was unsuccessful.

In Germany, the Vignale Gamine was remembered as a small car with a completely open body in the style of a roadster based on the Fiat 500 , which could be ordered for a short time from Otto mail order company.

Tatra 613 Coupé Vignale (1969)
NSU-Fiat Jagst Riviera, Vignale 1961
Fiat 125S Samantha

An unusual cooperation arose in the second half of the 1960s with the Czech car manufacturer Tatra , for whom Vignale drew the modern body of the Tatra 613 and also made the first three prototypes by hand. The contracts were signed in 1968, the first three chassis were delivered to Turin in December of the same year despite the political events ( Prague Spring ) and the first prototype was completed in early 1969. In contrast to the sedan version, the third prototype, a coupé , did not go into series production later .

The cooperation between the Italian car designer and according to plan economizing motor vehicle manufacturers from the former Czechoslovakia made at that time in the automotive world a stir. However, this design did not come from the pen of Alfredo Vignale himself or that of Giovanni Michelotti, but was the work of a little-known Vignale employee named Varesio (his first name has not been passed down), who was actually not a designer, but a trained coachbuilder. Nevertheless, this design is one of the longest used in automotive history, because the T613 was built only slightly changed from 1974 to 1996. Its successor and so far the last Tatra car, the Tatra 700 , which was built in small numbers from 1996 to 1998 , was based on the body of the T613, especially at the front and later also at the rear, despite some changes made by Tatra itself.

At the end of the 1960s, Vignale, like many other bodywork companies, got into economic difficulties. Automobile series and mass production caused problems for bodybuilders worldwide. Alfredo Vignale sold his company in 1969 to Carrozzeria Ghia , another Turin design studio that had belonged to De Tomaso for several years and died a few days after the sale on November 16, 1969 in a car accident, the cause of which remained unclear.

In 1974 the company was dissolved under the direction of Ghia or De Tomaso.

Even today, automobiles with Vignale bodies win prizes, for example at the Concorso d'Eleganza Villa d'Este and, depending on the technical components, they occasionally fetch high prices for enthusiasts.

Two nephews of Alfredo Vignales, the Basano brothers, were also active in the automotive industry in Turin, from the early 1960s with their own workshop for building prototypes, then from 1962 to 1966 as the founder and co-owner of Carrozzeria Sibona-Basano . The early prototype workshop produced, among other things, several bodies for Vignale, namely in 1960 several Alfa Romeo 2000 Coupés and the Chevrolet Corvette Kelly-Vignale as a one-off; the latter was designed by the American designer Gordon Kelly , an employee of Brooks Stevens' design office . At least one of the Basano brothers moved to Carrozzeria Vignale after giving up his independent activity towards the end of 1966.

Well-known own models

Fiat base

The name in the Ford group today

Ford Focus Tournament Vignale

1970 Ford took over the Carrozzeria Ghia and thus the naming rights to Ghia and Vignale. Since then, Ghia has referred to the more sophisticated equipment of Ford models as an addition.

In 1993, the British sports car manufacturer Aston Martin at the Motor Show in Geneva , a design study named Lagonda Vignale ago. Aston Martin was taken over by the US automobile manufacturer Ford that year and was therefore able to use the name Vignale .

Ford presented the concept study Focus Vignale Concept at the 2004 Paris Motor Show to revive the familiar name. From March 2007 to July 2010, the study was built in series as the Focus Coupé-Cabriolet . At the IAA 2013 Ford presented the Ford Mondeo Vignale , which should stand for a more sophisticated equipment line with additional services. This should go into series production as an equipment designation as early as 2014.

With the Vignale Edition, Ford has been offering a luxury equipment line for the Ford Fiesta, Ford Focus, Ford Kuga and the Ford Edge since autumn 2017.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The company Carrozzeria Sibona-Basano on the website osi20mts.com , accessed on February 5, 2016 (English).
  2. ↑ Elvio Deganello, in: Auto Italia (magazine), issue 227 (January 2015), “Italian Coachbuilders - Carrozzeria Sibona-Basano ”, pp. 50–54 (51, 54), background report on the company Carrozzeria Sibona-Basano (English ), available on the porschecarshistory.com web portal .
  3. ^ Spiegel Online: Ford Concept Vignale: Just a car? Insufficient

Web links

Commons : Vignale  - collection of images, videos and audio files