To a gearhead, concept cars can be emotional roller coasters. They blow you away with their styling and inspire fantasies of owning something so visually exciting and distinctive, but it doesn’t take long before reality sets in. Concepts rarely make it into production looking the way they did on a manufacturer’s car show stand. Many of them have been destroyed because they weren’t street-legal and the automakers who created them didn’t have storage space for them. The Concept Speedtop that BMW recently showcased at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este 2025 won’t meet that fate because BMW is going to put it into production – but not for long.
So what exactly is a Speedtop? That’s BMW-speak for a three-door interpretation of one of its Touring (aka wagon) models, essentially a shooting brake. It certainly has a concept car look to its V-shaped front end, slim headlights, and the center spines that run down the middle of the hood and the roof. Even the paint job has a show-car flare to it, transitioning on the roof from Floating Sunstone Maroon to Floating Sundown Silver.
The two-seat interior has a similar two-tone look. According to BMW, “Here, the brown ‘Sundown Maroon’ world harmonizes with the light ‘Moonstone White’ of the seats. The two-tone leather upholstery divides the dynamic and functional areas of the interior. The visually striking roof spline on the exterior is mirrored as a light beam in the two-tone leather headliner, providing atmospheric, indirect illumination.”
The open compartments behind the seats have leather straps designed to hold made-to-measure luggage for a weekend getaway. The leather-lined two-level trunk can hold a matching weekend bag. You may recognize the company that makes the luggage: Schedoni – the leather goods company that crafts the fitted bags that go inside the front and rear trunks of Ferraris. And if you’ve ever worn a pair of wingtips or longwings before, you’ll spot all of the brogue-style details on the upholstery.
BMW didn’t release any engine or performance stats for the Concept Speedtop, but the company did say that it will have “the most powerful V8 engine currently offered by BMW.” Assuming that excludes a full hybrid setup like the one in the M5 Touring, it seems as if the Concept Speedtop will be equipped with a 617-horsepower 4.4-liter twin-turbo V8, such as the one in the mild-hybrid X5 M Competition.
So how many Concept Speedtops will BMW produce? Seventy lucky collectors and enthusiasts will be able to get their hands on one. Perhaps we here at the ClassicCars.com Journal will see one at a future Arizona Concours d’Elegance. If we do, we’ll be sure to share our experience with you.