SECond to None

The genius of Bruno Sacco was on full display in the SEC, and yet, he was only getting started. The Italian-born designer — an alum of the Polytechnic University of Turin and Carrozzeria Ghia, who, at age 24 in 1958, was hired by Mercedes-Benz in Sindelfingen —would take over the automaker’s Styling Department in the mid-1970s and lead it until his 1999 retirement. Under his watch, this company would build the trendsetting 190 and 300 E, and reimagine the venerable SL for the 1990s and beyond. But the first major production-model project bearing his signature was the 126-chassis S-Class flagship, in both its four-door sedan and two-door coupe forms. The sedan was influential and enduring; his coupe, the SEC introduced in 1981 and built through 1991, was a masterpiece.

Germany’s oldest and most venerated automaker had a long history of creating elegant and expensive solid-roof two-doors that were derived from