To: January 04, 2025
Nuccio Bertone first came onto the Italian coachbuilders’ scene in the early 1930s, entering his father’s workshop before his 20th birthday. Born into the profession, he had already spent much of his free time there applying sound insulation to bodywork and also designing his first cars, flat profile drawings without shading or perspective. Encouraged by Giovanni, and with the typical enthusiasm of youth, Nuccio also faced other business problems when his father took the big step of transferring the artisan factory of Via Monginevro to the new plant at Corso Peschiera 225 in 1934. The shrewd management and invaluable experience gained in previous years meeting the demands, mainly of factories, led to more appropriate production structures and new machining procedures. This modernisation process enabled the construction of small series of special bodywork to be expanded to satisfy the gradual expansion to wider social sectors of the automotive market. This was gaining new momentum in 1933-34 when Lancia made its debut in the market with the Augusta and Fiat with the 4-speed 508 Balilla 4; both brands were designed with all-metal bodywork.
The need to meet customer demand better resulting from an increased taste for custom-built cars whose mechanics originated from standard models led to new commercial practices. The sales networks of car manufacturers were used to promote coachbuilders’ products adequately. Nuccio achieved his first success in this, offering brand agents throughout Italy vehicles with different aesthetic requirements (a coupé or cabriolet) from those of the standard saloon. In just a few years, car bodies produced to order for private individuals had almost completely disappeared, replaced by those prepared on behalf of the sales agents of the large companies. The many innovations introduced in factories to rationalise the production cycle forced the cartwright off the scene to make way for designers, joiners and metal polishers. Nevertheless, the bodywork was semi-metallic in the Balilla della Signora, masterfully designed by Mario Revelli di Beaumont mainly for women. Nuccio became professionally mature through the not always easy relationship with car dealers and, at his father’s side, became increasingly involved in the day-to-day running of the company that now employed 150 people.
The new aesthetic trends appeared in the mid-1930s, abandoning a purely engineering approach that was not very receptive to the initial designs. On the other hand, the major car manufacturers had started to realise how the look of the car had become an all-important factor for their commercial success. Bertone promptly softened the shape of its bodywork with rounded roofs, wrap-round mudguards, streamlined lights and tapered tail sections hiding a spare wheel and small boot. Mario Revelli was the master craftsman of this radical architectural change. He was a sensitive painter and innovative aesthete and the young Nuccio enthusiastically adapted to his inspirations, thus contributing to the distinction of the cars built in Turin with a clearly sporty approach.
110th Anniversary of the birth of Nuccio Bertone
The virtual exhibition on Nuccio Bertone will be an extraordinary anthem to both his creativity and continuous challenges as an entrepreneur, who stood out for his ability to change the power relations with the sector industry profoundly. From a chronological point of view, the exhibition will start from the end of the Second World War, when car manufacturers experienced a severe recession due to the lack of raw materials and the general poverty which imposed a significant period of austerity on the car industry. It will then evolve over the years with a fantastic review of splendid cars not only archived as unique examples (nowadays rare collectors’ pieces) but also mass produced ones, where Bertone had its most effective role of interpretation.
This euphoric period saw the historical advent of unibody construction, adopted for the first time by the Fiat 1400 in 1950. It was a major challenge for bodybuilders as it imposed a new technical and production approach to creating a vehicle without a frame and therefore without valid support points to anchor the bodywork to according to traditional systems. Nuccio and his engineers adopted the new construction practices enthusiastically, building an exciting series of projects that led to the breathtaking Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint. This lucky coupé, that met with resounding sales success, gave rise to an incessant sequence of sophisticated motor vehicles that highlighted the special personality of Italian Gran Turismo in the international market. At the end of the 1950s, tireless and always forward thinking, Nuccio felt the pressing need for a new and more modern production plant which came into operation in Grugliasco, in the suburbs of Turin, in 1959.
The other point of view of this virtual exhibition is based on the work of various designers who, under his sometimes bold if not reckless guidance, endlessly fuelled the evolutionary process of custom-built bodywork. A man of refined taste who devoted his life to making the most of new design talents, contrary to the practice of other master coachbuilders where team work was favoured within their respective companies rather than highlighting the individual talent of designers. The initial admirable models created just after the war by Giovanni Michelotti in the incomparable school of Mario Revelli were made by Bertone with the most varied mechanical parts. These were followed, in 1952, by the creativity, sometimes bordering on extravagance, of Franco Scaglione, gifted with an expressive quality aimed at surprising through the emotional challenge of the new and the rejection of conventional solutions. In December 1959, Giorgetto Giugiaro, a young designer at Fiat, approached Nuccio to enhance his aspirations proving to have exceptional imagination in conceiving innovative shapes for Aston Martins, BMWs and Iso Rivoltas up to the prototype of the so-called “Ferrarina” presented by ASA in 1961 and that on the rear-engined Chevrolet Corvair. Dozens of spectacular cars were made between 1960 and 1965 qualifying the Carrozzeria Bertone in both the specific sector and with the public as a forward-thinking company.
The reputation of the Grugliasco studio reached its height in 1966 with the Lamborghini Miura, designed by Marcello Gandini. The same designer surprised the following year with the Marzal prototype and the sensational Espada 400 GT, of which Nuccio produced over 1,200 units, as well as the revolutionary 1968 Carabo on the Alfa Romeo 33/2 Stradale mechanics. The 1970 Stratos proved even more amazing. It could hardly be compared to the category of motor vehicles because of its aesthetic standards that totally transformed those adopted until that time. The close succession of concept-cars archived by Bertone 1970s and 1980s were a fantastic creative period. Nuccio’s intervention to innovate the stylistic approach was confirmed in 1980 with the Lamborghini Athon prototype, a 2 seater streamlined sports car designed by the Frenchman Marc Deschamps; there were also two prototypes with Corvette mechanics. In that wonderful exultation of projects, Bertone also excelled in the search for new forms of mobility, as in the case of the electric traction Zero Emission Record (Z.E.R.) prototype which broke some world speed records in 1994. Two surprising unique examples were the Porsche Carisma in 1994, an ambitious 4-seater saloon with 911 mechanics, and the Kayak in 1995, a charming interpretation for a gran turismo coupé originating from the Lancia k saloon, conceptually inspired by the Italian school of the 1950s. A form of nostalgia after more than 60 years of an extraordinary, impassioned career.
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