A Short History Of The VW Karmann Ghia (cont.)

Karmann approached Serge in 1953 with the brief to design VW’s image car. Luigi Boano who had acquired the Carozzeria Ghia styling house in 1944 had been producing “concept” cars for Chrysler since the 1930’s, including the D’Elegance mentioned previously, and it has been suggested that the Ghia wasn’t a completely new design, but more a “re-work” of an original but unused design for Chrysler, thus provoking the debate as to the origins of the design.

Others suggest that Boano had originally sketched the car out in 1950, unbeknown to VW or Karmann, but VW had refused to sell him a car to base a prototype on. Whatever the truth, the new body shell was mounted upon a lengthened and widened Beetle floor pan.