What happens when a tiny urban car falls into the hands of designers accustomed to creating much more striking proposals? GFG Style decided to test it with the Fiat Topolino and turned the small electric car into the basis of two design exercises that have little to do with the original model.
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The firm led by Fabrizio Giugiaro worked with Lapo Elkann to develop the Top.L and Top.J projects.
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In both cases, the idea was to move away from power and performance to demonstrate that design can also turn a simple vehicle into something special.
Top.L is the closest proposal to a sports car. GFG Style removed much of the conventional elements of the Topolino and turned it into a small two-place speedster discovered.
The car looks like a matte aquamarine finish, while the interior combines leather and Alcantara in similar tones.The concept takes inspiration from the “Little Bastard”, the Porsche 550 Spyder related to James Dean.
The Topolinoins its dimensions reduced, but its new configuration gives it a much more aggressive and recreative appearance.
Top.J retains the compact character of the Fiat, but incorporates four seats spread back to back.
The design also recovers a combination of blue and green inspired by a Ferrari 166 MM that belonged to Gianni Agnelli, Lapo Elkann's grandfather. This historical reference contrasts with the size and concept of the small electric car.
The roof was replaced by a cloth cover and the interior blends leather with rice cloth.The result is closer to a piece of design than a conventional car.
Top.L and Top.J do not seek to turn the Topolino into a high-performance sports car or change its function as an urban vehicle. The goal of GFG Style was to take advantage of its dimensions to experiment with the shapes, materials and distribution of space.
That’s exactly what’s interesting about these two projects. A model designed for short displacements ended up becoming a kind of canvas for two proposals that take their designs to completely different places.
