Dr. Elio Zagato passed away on Monday at the age of 88. The father of Andrea and son of Ugo Zagato, he will be deeply missed by the whole automobile industry and car enthusiasts worldwide but will also be fondly remembered for the great contribution he made to automotive history and for the deep love he always had for Gran Turismo cars and racing.

The son of Ugo Zagato, the founder of the famous Milanese Atelier which has been renown across the world since 1919 for its custom made car bodies, Elio was a figure of great importance in the history of global automotive design and in the Gran Turismo race scene of the post-war era.

An entrepreneur, racer and gentleman driver, he competed for the first time in Piacenza in 1947, driving a Fiat which had just been re-bodied as a graduation gift from his father.

From that point onwards he never stopped developing his beloved Gran Turismos, working on them during the week and then testing them during the weekends. He was amongst the founders of the Milanese Scuderia Sant Ambroeus. He embodied with perfection the style, elegance, and competitive spirit of the Italian gentleman driver of the ‘Dolce Vita’ era.

In the early 1950s he started developing the world’s most desired berlinette GTs. Amongst all of them we fondly remember the Fiat 8V Zagato, which he claimed to be his favourite, the Alfa Romeo 1900 SSZ which was often his rival in various races, the legendary Ferrari 250 GTZ, Maserati A6G, Aston Martin DB4 GTZ and many more.

He took part in the golden age of competitions when drivers raced with vests and helmets, and duelled alongside famous characters such as Ascari, Fangio, Galluzzi, Nuvolari, Stagnoli, and many others. Enzo Ferrari called him “Zagatino.”

Together with his good friend Ercole Spada he developed the legendary Alfa Romeo SZ, TZ and TZ2 lines and followed these up with a string of elegant Lancia sports models that were based on Appia, Flavia, Flaminia, and Fulvia chassis. A constant innovator, together with his father Ugo he invented the celebrated double bubble, signature mark of the Milanese brand, the ‘Coda Tronca’, windows made out of plexiglas, and countless other solutions still used on modern vehicles today. Zagato's cars were renown for their lightness due to using materials that were advanced for their day. He took over running the family firm in the late 1960s.

Elio was accomplished on the track and participated in one hundred and fifty automotive races, impressively winning eighty two of them, and becoming champion of the GT series a remarkable five times. He was victorious in the Targa Florio, no less than eight Coppa Intereuropas, won three first places in the Golden Cup of the Dolomites, and came in first in the highly prestigious Berlin Avus Cup in 1955.

A keen promoter of the Milanese concept of minimalism oriented towards functionalist design, Elio defined his Zagatos first and foremost as ‘original.’ Whoever asked him to synthesise the design spirit of his car bodies, he would simply reply to them: “You see that car? Is it different from all the others? Then it’s a Zagato.”

Andrea and Marella Zagato, today, in the year of Zagato’s 90th anniversary, keep the spirit of the Atelier coachbuilder alive and well, a trade that Elio learned from Ugo and promoted throughout his brilliant career. Earlier this year Zagato presented the Perana Z-One at the 79th Geneva Motor Show, a sports car concept that adhered to all of Zagato's finest traditions and is destined for limited production, while its recent one-off coachbuilt Ferrari 575 GTZ recieved widespread praise.