With much speculation swirling over the last week that Bertone's recent Suagnà prototype could form the basis of a new Lancia 'Coupé-Cabriolet' model with a 20,000 units per year production target, Forbes have given this Fiat Grande Punto-based concept car its seal of approval, choosing it as their car of the week.

The Suagnà was presented by the Italian design and engineering firm Bertone at the Geneva International Motor Show last month, and is a realistic look at a Fiat entry into what is a fashionable and rapidly growing niche market segment, that for folding roof convertibles.

Another Sexy Bertone - report from Forbes

Any serious story about history's best concept cars will mention Bertone, the Italian design house that has styled production models and showcars for a wide range of automakers, from Volvo to Mazda to Lamborghini. Such prototypes as Bertone's Lancia Stratos of 1970 are considered landmarks in automotive history - says Dan Lienert.

Some may be surprised to learn that Bertone and its Italian peers don't just style Ferraris and other exotic cars. In fact, mainstream automakers often hire the Italian design houses to style, build or make over some of the most humble cars--a wise move, since Italian cars are known for their looks, if not for their durability. In recent years, Daewoo has hired Giugiaro to style cars, and General Motors commissioned Pininfarina to build a Saturn prototype.

At the recent Geneva Motor Show, Bertone unveiled the Suagnà prototype, a treatment of a populist auto, Fiat's Grande Punto compact car. With the Suagnà, Bertone has taken a rather pedestrian vehicle and given it a swank interior and something you don't see on cheap cars: a retractable, hard-top roof.
 

To rethink the notion that compact cars must have tiny backseats, Bertone spent much of its budget on the Suagnà refashioning the Fiat to give it "four proper seats," as the company called them in a recent statement.

To reshape the Fiat's interior, Bertone conducted what it calls "highly advanced ergonomic and volumetric studies, which aimed at achieving levels of roominess and onboard quality never seen before" in this size of vehicle. The Suagnà, Bertone says, has interior room that is more typical of larger, more luxurious cars. Finding ways to whittle out extra bits of space in the Fiat's cockpit was an interesting approach. Most automakers, when customizing other manufacturers' cars to make attention-grabbing showcars, will tend to beef up the horsepower or make over-the-top exterior modifications. But with the Suagnà, Bertone worked with a scalpel, not a sledgehammer; in fact, the car's name in Piedmontese dialect means "a job done painstakingly, in which one pays scrupulous attention to every detail."

On the Suagnà, the raised, muscular tail holds the roof, which folds in two into the trunk. The rear end links to the high, arching waistline, which gives tension to the whole side. The way the masses seem to urge forward is partly the effect of a slash that emphasizes the waistline. The low, sleek roof forms a single whole with the sloping windscreen. The car has 18-inch alloy wheels at its corners. Bertone tries to focus on using innovative materials in its prototypes. The Suagnà's seats, for example, have leather side strips with a special "crumpled" effect, and a central strip of what the company calls "high-tech fabric" -- fabric which makes the seats look as if they are woven with intertwined aluminium.

The Suagnà is not as sexy as a Lamborghini, but it was built by people who have styled Lamborghinis. And it was designed to inspire buyers at the opposite end of the pricing spectrum. The Suagnà should teach you that even the most humble of cars can accommodate the kind of advanced Italian styling that has delighted auto-show attendees for decades.

Report courtesy of Forbes