Skip to main content

The lost BMW


Image result for 1970 bmw logo

The lost BMW Garmisch an interesting story behind a vanilla sedan, the famous Italian designer Marcello Gandini had designed a small 4 door BMW sedan in the year 1970, the car was supposed to be a concept. This concept showcased what the future sedans were going to be. But what happened later makes this car more interesting.


About the designer
Marcello Gandini was born on 26th august 1938 in Turin, Gandini approached Bertone group of design for a job but was denied. Gandini’s design extends beyond cars as he is also an industrial designer and a home accessories. He was the head designer until 1980 in Bertone, after this changed his path to become a freelance designer.  
BMW has had a long history with Italian design houses such as the BMW 328 mille miglia designed by Peter Szymanowski

Image result for bmw garmisch





The BMW Garmisch was an idea that originally came from Nuccio Bertone himself who wanted to showcase this car as a surprise car at the Geneva motor show to mark the positive relationship between Bertone and BMW. The design language was to follow that of BMW which meant it was going to be very dynamic, and proactive. The Garmisch was a sleek and clean design with Gandini’s signature honey-comb mesh covering the rear glass. The two door midsize sedan was finished in this champagne color. The vertically stacked kidney grill is a first and a pretty attractive twist on the traditional kidney grill.





The interior was pure perfection and met the demands of the 1970’s. The passenger side of the dash opened to a large mirror, vertically stacked AC controls and radio controls made up the middle of the dash, followed by the gear shifter.  The re-created model of the Garmisch was built on the BMW 2002’s rolling chassis.




The only proof that such a concept existed was word of mouth and five sketches of the concept, the actually car is nowhere to be found, BWM chose to rebuild this particular car as it a true stand out in the modern range of BMW cars and even in the present SUV dominated era. The car is named after a once-prominent upper-crust German ski village that played host to the 1936 winter Olympics, the car stands out to me and many others not just with modern BMW’s but with old one’s as well, because it looks like a fish bowl from certain angels. Over all it still remains a car with a very murky background and remains an oddball in BMW’s lineup of cars, an oddball that has a story to tell. The car also shows us the era when BMW relied on the big Italian design houses.







  
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ford almost built a Mid-engined Corvette rival in 1986? History of the Ford GN34

Ford GT40 crushed the Ferrari at Le Mans in the 60’s but 20 years later it was still Ferraris and Porsches winning the sales with highly profitable sports cars. In the domestic market the Corvette was also a great success though it never offered the same quality or feel as its European rivals. It looked like Ford was just letting go of a great opportunity to grab some profits with their own sports car.  Two design houses that were part of this project  Behind closed curtains Ford's very own Specialty vehicle operations (SVO) decided to work on creating a fast mid-engined sports car that would compete with the other fast European premium sports cars but at the price of a Corvette. The project started in late 1983 with the code name GN34. The project would use resources from around the world with Italian styling, British chassis engineering, European assembly standards and would also boast of the built tough reliability. The full details of this project was never fully revealed ...
3 comments
Read more

Isdera a forgotten German supercar manufacturer

  A German Supercar few would know ever existed The Automotive industry in the 80’s and early 90’s witnessed the arrival of many small supercar, sports car and other exotic cars as well. This one car company that was founded in Germany is truly unique. Most people do not associate Germany to be the first country to have founded a supercar. The company is called Isdera, a small engineering company, Ingenieurbüro für Styling, Design und Racing ( in English Engineering office for styling, design and racing) in short Isdera.  Eberhard Schulz The story behind the company   Isdera was founded by Eberhard Schulz, the company still remains known by very few people despite having been started in 1982. The origin of the company starts early in 1966 when Eberhard Schulz decided to build his own sports car to have as a reference while looking for jobs as he had dropped out of mechanical engineering. The design reference for him at the time was a Ford GT40. He built the tubular space...
3 comments
Read more

A brief history of the Dauer 962 LM

Dauer 962 Lm  An un-heard of car that could out perform a McLaren F1, as it was built on the Porsche 962 Le mans car.   This car had such outstanding performance as it took a different approach when compared to the other early hyper cars, it was a Le Mans car built for the road. To understand the success of the Dauer 962 one must note the success of Porsche 962 in group C class in Le Mans and all the other endurance races along with its  predecessor the 965 were well renowned in the endurance race scene. Porsche built 150 962’s and sold it to other privet racing teams and certain individual customers, knowing the amount of strain an endurance car goes through Porsche built a parts supply that would suffice all the racing teams. One of the most famous teams that used the parts or chassis from the 962 was the Schuppan motor sports who later on produced 5 Schuppan 962 cr. amongst these teams even Dauer was one such team.  The Daure 962 was sh...
Post a Comment
Read more