The near-moribund Italian car company Lancia has been prompted by its new owners Stellantis to join the electric-car rush in Europe by 2028 with three new electric vehicles.
This week Lancia revealed a piece of floating art inspired by its rallying legend, the Lancia Stratos, featuring a modern interpretation of its T-shaped grille.
Luca Napolitano, Lancia’s CEO, said the concept car without wheels symbolized the brand’s future.
Lancia’s sculpture design language will evolve into the redesigned Ypsilon hatchback, a reborn Delta and an unnamed flagship within six years.
As Mercedes-Benz teased at the 2012 Detroit Auto Show, its Aesthetics S concept car was based on a sculpture. It’s not the first time a car company has done it.
“It is timeless, durable, unique. Our designs will be built with iconic and pure shapes like the circle, square and triangle,” Jean-Pierre Ploué, head designer at Lancia, said.
The 2024 will feature the rear design language.
The rear end design of the sculpture will find its way onto the first Lancia EV, which will replace the Ypsilon in 2024.
It will initially be sold in four countries, including Italy, France, Germany and the UK (so it will be produced in right-hand drive) and then across the rest of Europe.
“We want to make Lancia a respected brand within the European premium market,” Napolitano said.
“Today is the beginning of our renaissance that will amaze Lancia fans all over the world.
“Lancia will once again be a desirable, respected and reliable brand in the European premium market. Today is the beginning of the new Lancia.”
The new Ypsilon will be based on the Stellantis STLA (small electric vehicle) architecture, which underpins the Peugeot e-208 and the Opel Corsa Electric, and which will also serve as the basis for Alfa Romeo’s first EV in 2024.
With Lancia’s sales world shrinking from a global market to Europe and now, only sold in Italy, the former Italian innovation powerhouse’s design department has been incredibly underemployed for the past decade.
It has only been sold in Italy with one model: the Ypsilon hatchback, launched in 2011 and facelifted in 2015.
Lancia’s sales declined from 300,000 cars in 1990 to just over 43,000 in 2021 – coincidentally, the number of cars sold by Australia’s Holden GM brand in 2019.
Stellantis, formed from PSA (Peugeot, Citroen, DS, Opel) and FCA (Fiat, Lancia, Maserati, Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Jeep, RAM, Abarth), gave Lancia a new lease on life – and a rare chance to survive.
Despite not even competing since 1993, Lancia still holds the most World Rally Championship manufacturer’s crowns (10) of any automaker.
The Lancia Fulvia, the Stratos powered by Ferrari, the 037 Rallye, the Delta HF and the Delta HF Integrale all won titles for the company.
Against Porsche, it won the 1980 and 1981 World Sportscar championships with its D50, rebadged as a Ferrari for Juan Manuel Fangio in 1956.
