TYPE 14 VW KARMANN GHIA
The Karmann Ghia has often been dismissed as all style and no substance. The first part is certainly right – few cars have been so explicitly and entirely about looking pretty and the result is one of the most distinctive and attractive classic cars there is. But no substance? That’s a charge made in error by people expecting the Karmann to back up its sleek, jet-age looks with similar performance. All the Karmann Ghia ever had to do was be a very handsome variant on the Beetle, and it does that superbly – in teaming the stylistic masterstroke of one of the great Italian design houses with the high build quality of a German coachbuilder, VW cooked up a recipe for an enduring and very appealing car that was a classic from the moment it was launched.
The genesis of the Karmann Ghia came in the early 1950s when economic strength and rising living standards across Europe made Volkswagen consider broadening their product’s appeal away from mere economy and reliability – something you bought because you had to – and into something with a bit more flair and aspiration. Wilhelm Karmann’s coachbuilding operation (something of a misnomer for a firm that had pioneered specialist assembly of all-metal and monocoque cars and could turn out complete vehicles in large volumes) was already building the convertible versions of the Beetle. A chance meeting with Luigi Segre of Ghia in early 1953 led to the stylist and the coachbuilder working up a prototype.
Taking cues from contemporary American cars but on a smaller, more pleasing scale, the result was presented to Volkswagen CEO Nordhoff later that year, and the project approved. Production began in 1955, with Karmann building the bodyshells on a slightly widened version of
