In the long conversation between heritage and commerce, two designers have quietly posed a question that Stellantis cannot officially answer: what does it mean for a storied Italian marque to be 'special'? While the revived Lancia Gamma arrives in 2026 as a practical electric crossover sharing its bones with Peugeots and Jeeps, professors and former Pininfarina hands have conjured a sleek grand tourer in pixels — reaching back to Aldo Brovarone's 1970s coupe as a reminder that specialness was once measured in daring, not market segments. The rendering will not be built, but it circulates, and
Designers Reimagine Classic Lancia Gamma as Electric Coupe in CGI Concept
What if specialty meant design-led, not just smaller and cheaper?
Mark
So Stellantis has basically told Lancia to become a niche brand. What does that actually mean for the cars they'll build?
Mimi
It means fewer resources, fewer models, and a narrower strategic focus. Lancia is now managed by Fiat as a specialty brand, which is different from being a core brand like Jeep or Peugeot. The new Gamma is a crossover-SUV because that's what the market wants and what the shared platform supports.
Luke
But here's the thing—we don't know if that strategy will work for Lancia specifically. The company's heritage is built on distinctive, design-forward sedans and coupes, not SUVs. The Gamma SUV might be efficient, but does it actually serve the brand's identity?
Mimi
That's exactly what the designers are asking. Rittgers and Camardella created a coupe concept that reaches back to the original 1976 Gamma, which was an Italian executive car. They're saying: what if specialty meant design-led, not just smaller and cheaper?
Mark
Who are these designers, and why should we take their concept seriously?
Mimi
Rittgers is a professor at IED Torino, a major design school. Camardella worked at Pininfarina and the Fiat Group—he's not some random enthusiast. They have credibility in the industry, which is why their work circulates through design communities.
Luke
But it's still unofficial. It's a CGI rendering, not a business proposal. We shouldn't overstate what it means. The Gamma SUV is what's actually being built.
Mimi
True. But in design culture, these concepts matter. They keep alternative visions alive. They ask questions that official products can't.
Mark
So the coupe concept won't be built, but it's part of a conversation about what Lancia could be?
Mimi
Exactly. It exists in parallel to the production car, challenging the assumptions behind it.
Luke
And that conversation is valuable, but it's also worth noting that Stellantis has already made its choice. The SUV is the bet they're making on Lancia's future.
O Pulso
- Stellantis has repositioned Lancia as a specialty brand, but the first product under that banner — a crossover SUV on a shared platform — reads more like consolidation than distinction.
- The flagship Gamma HF Integrale offers 375 horsepower and 675 kilometers of range, yet its efficiency and pragmatism sit uneasily against a nameplate once synonymous with Italian design audacity.
- IED Torino professor Rittgers and former Pininfarina designer Camardella bypassed the official brief entirely, producing a CGI coupe that channels the original 1976 Gamma's low, long silhouette into a retro-modern electric grand tourer.
- Their rendering asks the sharpest possible question: if 'specialty' means fewer resources and narrower ambition, has the brand's revival already conceded the very thing that made it worth reviving?
- The concept spreads through digital design communities, functioning less as a protest than as a parallel possibility — proof that the coupe path existed, even if the SUV path was chosen.
- The Gamma SUV heads to the 2026 Paris Motor Show; the Rittgers-Camardella coupe heads nowhere but the imagination — and for those who track what cars could be, that distinction is the whole story.
In the long conversation between heritage and commerce, two designers have quietly posed a question that Stellantis cannot officially answer: what does it mean for a storied Italian marque to be 'special'? While the revived Lancia Gamma arrives in 2026 as a practical electric crossover sharing its bones with Peugeots and Jeeps, professors and former Pininfarina hands have conjured a sleek grand tourer in pixels — reaching back to Aldo Brovarone's 1970s coupe as a reminder that specialness was once measured in daring, not market segments. The rendering will not be built, but it circulates, and in circulating, it keeps a different kind of ambition alive.
Stellantis has remade Lancia into a specialty brand, and the first major expression of that repositioning is the 2026 Gamma — a premium electric crossover-SUV sharing its modular platform with the DS No. 7, the Peugeot 3008, and the new Jeep Compass. The flagship Gamma HF Integrale runs dual motors, a 97-kWh battery, and 375 horsepower, with a claimed range of 675 kilometers. It is a sensible product for a company that has consolidated around four core brands and assigned Lancia a narrower, regionally focused role.
Two designers looked at that decision and imagined a different one. Giacinto Francesco Rittgers, a professor at IED Torino, and Pietro Camardella, a veteran of Pininfarina and the Fiat Group, produced an unofficial CGI concept that sets aside the SUV mandate entirely. Instead, they returned to the original Lancia Gamma coupe — the sleek two-door Aldo Brovarone designed for Pininfarina in the 1970s — and recast it as a modern electric grand tourer: long, low, and deliberately retro-modern.
The contrast illuminates a real tension. The original Gamma debuted in 1976 as Lancia's executive flagship, and the brand used its platform to explore multiple expressions — a Pininfarina Spider, an Italdesign Megagamma minivan, a Pininfarina shooting brake. Design was treated as a conversation. The new Gamma, by contrast, is engineered for volume efficiency and shared costs, which is precisely what Stellantis' FaSTLAne 2030 strategy demands of a specialty brand with limited resources.
The Rittgers-Camardella concept makes no claim to production readiness. It is a digital what-if, circulating through design communities and asking whether Lancia's specialty status might mean something bolder than smaller and more focused. The Gamma SUV will debut at the 2026 Paris Motor Show, competent and market-ready. The coupe will remain a rendering — a parallel universe where a different kind of specialness was chosen. For now, the SUV wins. But the coupe gets to exist in pixels, and for those who care about what cars could be, that is not nothing.
Stellantis has remade Lancia into a specialty brand, and the Italian automaker's first major move under that new arrangement arrived in 2026: a premium compact crossover-SUV called the Gamma, built on the same modular platform as the DS No. 7, the latest Peugeot 3008, and the new Jeep Compass. It's a practical choice, engineered to accept mild hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and fully electric powertrains. The flagship version, the Gamma HF Integrale, runs dual motors and a 97-kilowatt-hour battery, producing 375 horsepower and claiming a range of up to 675 kilometers. It's a sensible product for a company that has consolidated its resources around four core brands—Jeep, Ram, Peugeot, and Fiat—while repositioning everything else into regional or specialty roles.
But two designers looked at that decision and saw a different path. Giacinto Francesco Rittgers, a professor at IED Torino, and Pietro Camardella, a former Pininfarina and Fiat Group designer, created an unofficial CGI concept that ignores the SUV mandate entirely. Instead, they reached back to the original Lancia Gamma coupe—the sleek two-door that Aldo Brovarone designed for Pininfarina in the 1970s—and reimagined it as a modern grand tourer. Their vision is long, low, and deliberately retro-modern, the kind of car that speaks to heritage rather than market segments.
The contrast matters because it reveals a tension in how legacy automakers are being reshaped. Stellantis' restructuring, announced as part of the FaSTLAne 2030 strategy under new CEO Antonio Filosa, treats Lancia as a specialty brand now managed by Fiat. That designation means fewer resources, a narrower product range, and a strategic focus on what sells in volume. The Gamma SUV makes sense in that context. It shares underpinnings with vehicles already in production. It taps into the crossover market. It's efficient.
The original Gamma, by contrast, was an Italian executive car—the flagship of Lancia's range when it debuted in 1976. It came primarily as a four-door fastback sedan called the Berlina, but the coupe variant became iconic enough that Lancia explored multiple body styles through concept cars: a Pininfarina Spider with a targa top, an Italdesign Megagamma minivan, and a Pininfarina shooting brake. The car represented a moment when Lancia could afford to experiment, to build multiple expressions of a single platform, to treat design as a conversation rather than a checklist.
Rittgers and Camardella's concept doesn't pretend to be production-ready. It's a digital sketch, a what-if, a conversation with the brand's own history. But it circulates through design communities—shared on platforms like car.design.trends—and it asks a question that no official press release can ignore: what if Lancia's specialty status meant something other than smaller, cheaper, and more focused? What if it meant bolder, more distinctive, more willing to take risks on design?
The Gamma HF Integrale will arrive at the 2026 Paris Motor Show as Lancia's electric flagship, built to compete in the premium compact crossover segment. It will be competent and efficient. The Rittgers-Camardella coupe will remain a rendering, a parallel universe where Lancia chose a different kind of specialty—one rooted in the brand's design legacy rather than its market positioning. For now, the SUV wins. But in the world of digital design, the coupe gets to exist too, and that matters to the people who care about what cars could be.
Citações Notáveis
The Gamma HF Integrale flagship EV produces 375 horsepower from dual motors with a 97-kWh battery and up to 675 kilometers of range— Stellantis/Italian automotive sources
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