ON THE EDGE OF TOMORROW
ALFA ROMEO MONTREAL
05 May 2024 • Written By Virgiliu Andone
As revolutionary Italian designer Marcello Gandini closed his eyes, the deafening wall of black was broken by a flash of light. A sudden brightness permeated his eyelids, leaving a brief tail of orange on his resting retina. A cut through the dark. Gandini’s eyelids are now forever shut, but the rays that went through them will enlighten us for as long as we will keep on looking at his work.
It was with the March 1967 unveiling of the Lamborghini Marzal concept that the sharp, taylor-like styling trend made a splash onto the car design scene. Fresh from the unfathomable success of the Miura, launched just the year before, Gandini took the 1912-founded Carrozzeria Bertone in a completely new direction and instantly made everything else feel left behind the times. One year after the Marzal, Alfa Romeo got the first taste of the new design language, in the form of the Carabo supercar, announcing the brand’s design direction for the next twenty years. The stage was set for the creation of the car we took out for a closer look today.
We’re in Motorworld Munich, in a place formerly dedicated to another form of transportation. Starting in the 1920s, Deutsche Bahn, the German railways operator, used this building as a facility for servicing steam locomotives and later electric trains. Everything in here is on a giant scale, 75,000 sqm of an industrial temple of the past, with massive beams, bridges and cranes that transport you back to Fritz Lang’s 1927 Metropolis. For under the roof of this once neglected protected status hall is an entire city dedicated to the passion for the automobile.
With the city going quiet around us, we’ve come to the moment when the thoughts of the day crystalize in our minds. It’s easy to see why Marcelo Gandini considered the Montreal as his “Clair de lune”, his greatest ever partitura. A big admirer of classical music composer Claude Debbussy, having been introduced to his work by his French grandmother, Gandini evoked the same emotionally charged vibe of the Impressionistic piano piece with his orange painted peaks and black-blocked deep recesses of this Alfa.
Many of his creations impress, but this one is perhaps the one most adept at instigating love.
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