Compiling a list of the most beautiful Italian cars is a bit like trying to decide which of your children to keep and which one you want to give away – it’s an impossible task because there are so many good options. We could have looked exclusively to the Ferrari current and back catalogue, but we didn’t. Instead, we’re catering for a range of budgets covering cars that cost a few thousand pounds right through to several million. These are the beautiful Italian cars.
Ferrari 250LM
While the aggressive looks of Ferraris like the LaFerrari, Enzo, F50 and F40 for now exclude them from a list of the most beautiful Italian cars, the 250LM‘s classic-car status – its relatively dinky dimensions and its loving handmade body – mean it does qualify. The LM’s body looks like it’s been sculpted around the components below, with shapely hips hinting that it’s mid-engined but with none of the fussiness of a wind tunnel design.
While age has taken the aggression out of the LM’s styling, it has not dampened the performance. This Le Mans winner packs a 3.3-litre carburetted V12 that sounds wonderful, and under the skin, you’ll find innovations like disc brakes, a transaxle gearbox and double wishbone suspension.
Alfa Romeo GTV
The Alfa Romeo GTV can be found roaming the more affordable end of the beautiful Italian car market, with a few thousand pounds enough to buy yourself a perfect example. We could have chosen the 156 saloon (not as good looking) or the Brera (not actually that good to drive), but the GTV offers the best of both worlds.
For a kick-off, it looks great despite being in the dip of the graph that represents the no man’s land between old cars and classics. While Busso fans will demand the tuneful V6, the 2.0-litre Twinspark is the better option, without the more powerful car’s rear spoiler and fussy body kit. It’s also much better to drive hanging on to bends long after the big-engined car has ploughed through the corner.
Fiat Barchetta
‘Barchetta’ means “little boat” in Italian, and it’s easy to see why Fiat’s two-seater convertible got its name thanks to its Riva-like rear end and body-length crease that could be the waterline if the convertible was indeed a boat. The Fiat had some of the most elegant door handles ever fitted to a production car, with a push button that revealed the handles from bodywork and some of the best-looking steel wheels.
Only ever sold in left-hand drive, unsurprisingly, the Barchetta wasn’t a popular choice in the UK, selling in far fewer numbers than cars like the Mazda MX-5v and MG F. In fairness, the Fiat wasn’t the sweetest handling sports car either, thanks to the front-wheel drive chassis shared with the Fiat Punto hatchback, but its twin-cam engine sounded good and revved sweetly. Nowadays, its looks and rarity could swing it into favour against the far more common competition.
Maserati 3200GT
The Maserati 3200GT is a good-looking car, period, but it gets a place on this list simply because of its boomerang rear lights – the best-looking tail lights produced by any nation to date. Maserati went to great pains to make the rear beams look great, fitting LEDs (making the 3200GT the first car with LED tail lights) to get the precision of the light just right, so it’s a shame the design was changed in the facelifted model.
The 3200GT may not have handled like a Ferrari – it could be very snappy when the twin turbos spooled up – but it certainly didn’t lack pace; its 370PS (272kW) official power was massively underrated, avoiding stepping on the toes of the Ferrari 360. Nowadays, the Maserati looks like an absolute bargain, costing a sixth of the price of its cousin from Maranello.
Ferrari F355
The Ferrari F355 was the last of the old-school Ferraris in terms of looks and mechanicals. Up front, the F355’s grille could have been shared with older models like the Testarossa, and the same goes for the huge air scoops in the doors, and the vented engine cover and kinked tail. You could almost call it a modern interpretation of a classic Ferrari – what’s not like about that?
Mechanics also provide a perfect balance between new and old. The flat-plane crank V8 has reliability-enhancing modern fuel injection but none of the sound muffling filters of the latest cars, and although you get traction control, the F355 is too old to have annoying modern features like a speed limit warning and lane assist. Could this be the perfect Ferrari?
Lamborghini Miura
Much like the Ferrari 250LM earlier, age has evolved the Lamborghini Miura’s looks from being a breathtaking modern supercar to a beautiful classic that you can appreciate as a piece of art and not just for its phenomenal engineering and performance. The detail of Marcello Gandini’s design is something to behold. From its shark nose and eyelash headlights to its shapely shoulders and window shutter engine cover, the Miura is a car that looks good from all angles – befitting a machine dubbed the world’s first supercar.
The Miura’s mid-engine layout marked it out from its front-engine rivals at Ferrari, giving the Lamborghini superb traction and a perfect weight balance. The Miura’s V12 engine would be a staple of Lamborghini that only phased out with the arrival of the Aventador.
Classic Fiat Abarth 595
Fiat itself resurrected the styling of the 500 with the modern version – a car that looks surprisingly similar to the classic until you realise the modern one is twice the size of the classic it imitates. But with the small size comes beautifully cute looks, and they don’t come much cooler than in the original 595.
Wanting more zap from the (admittedly pretty feeble) standard 500, Abarth set to work reboring the cylinders, fitting a sporty cam and a new exhaust to release 30PS (22kW) from the Fiats air-cooled three-cylinder – double what it left the factory with. Tiny alloy wheels, flared wheel arches, and decals completed the look, but the final touch was the 595’s permanently opened engine cover needed because the new mechanicals didn’t fit in the tiny engine bay.
Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale
The Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale (Italian for “road-going”) was designed to bring the company’s formidable expertise in motorsport to a road car – it was the fastest car over a standing kilometre when it went on sale in 1967 and was also the most expensive car on sale at the time. Power came from an engine derived from the Montreal GT but with modifications, including a flat-plane crank. That translated to 0-62mph in less than six seconds, a near-160 mph top speed and a standing kilometre in 24 seconds dead – faster than more powerful rivals like the Ferrari Daytona and Lamborghini Miura.
More importantly, it also looked drop-dead gorgeous with an aluminium body vacuum-packed over the mechanicals below, and butterfly doors that curved their glass into the roof. But it’s best enjoyed from the rear, where you can fully appreciate its back clamshell, quad exhausts and steamroller tyres.
Lancia Aurelia
The Lancia Aurelia is one of the latest cars to be restomod, the Aurelia Outlaw chopping nearly 80mm from the standard car’s roof to accentuate the bold grille and pillar box windscreen. For us, though, the Aurelia looks just fine as it is.
Like any good Lancia, the Aurelia didn’t just look fist-bitingly good; it was also a mechanical marvel when it launched in 1951, boasting kit like inboard brakes, independent rear suspension and rear-mounted transaxle. Innovations that meant, despite the modest power of its 2.0-litre V6, the Lancia took second place at the ’51’s Mille Miglia behind a Ferrari 340 America with twice the horsepower.
Fiat Abarth 750 GT
The Fiat Abarth 750 GT is another example of a humble Italian with looks to die for. The 750 was based on the Fiat 600, but with an engine breathed on by Abarth bored out to 750cc to produce 50PS (37kW), not a lot but with just 535kg to push along, it didn’t need to be. In fact, the Abarth broke several records at its home track of Monza, including an average speed lap record of nearly 103 mph in 1957.
Its stunning looks earn this gentleman’s racer its place on this list. After being tuned by Abarth, the 750 GT was shipped to Zagato to be fitted with its stunning, double-bubble aluminium body. Nowadays, the market is wise to the 750 GT, and while it’s cheap for a Zagato-bodied car, you’ll still need a budget of around £100,000 to get your hands on one.
Report by Russell Campbell
