Save for the occasional unique Rolls-Royce, most of us thought coachbuilding was a lost art that died many decades ago. It’s one thing to design a pretty concept for car shows and another to actually build it. BMW has a long history of unveiling beautiful one-offs at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este, but none went into production until recently. There was last year’s Skytop, followed recently by the Speedtop. But what if you wanted something with Italian flair? Enter the Bovensiepen Zagato.
We first saw the M4-based stunner at the Villa d’Este and soon after at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. The coachbuilt BMW will debut in North America at Monterey Car Week on the Concept Car Lawn (August 8–17) and appear at The Quail, A Motorsports Gathering, on August 15.
Although a coupe, the car is actually based on the M4 Convertible, hence the absence of B-pillars. The Italian design house has worked on BMWs before (remember the Zagato Coupe and Roadster?), but this is its first project based on an M4. Zagato collaborated with Andreas and Florian Bovensiepen, sons of the late ALPINA founder Burkard Bovensiepen, to bring the car to life, double-bubble roof and all.
For the sake of clarity, the car doesn’t come from the traditional ALPINA company, now under the BMW Group umbrella. Instead, the two brothers founded a separate company, Bovensiepen Automobile, also based in Buchloe, like the historic firm their late father started 60 years ago.
Americans will now get to see the G83-based coupe up close, wearing a new carbon fiber skin over its original body. The Bovensiepen Zagato has dual-layer bodywork because removing the BMW panels would’ve required re-homologating the car. You can imagine that it would’ve been a costly process for a newly founded company. Keeping the OEM panels also means the coupe is just as safe as its BMW counterpart.
Bovensiepen has offset some of the weight penalty by ditching the M4 Convertible’s clunky roof mechanism. The coupe is actually 50 kilograms (110 pounds) lighter than the G83, tipping the scales at 1,875 kg (4,133 lbs). While massive changes have been made, the laser taillights are a clear giveaway that it’s based on a 4 Series.
There’s no manual gearbox, as this is meant to be a GT. Fitting a third pedal would have been tricky anyway since the M4 Convertible comes exclusively with all-wheel drive. All of BMW’s xDrive cars come exclusively in automatic guise. Bovensiepen has unlocked an extra 79 hp and 50 Nm (37 lb-ft) from the S58 twin-turbo 3.0-liter inline-six. However, the convertible-turned-coupe is more about its unique design.
Bovensiepen hasn’t finalized pricing, but the few planned examples will reportedly cost €400,000 to €500,000. Rumor has it BMW charged wealthy buyers half a million euros for the sold-out Skytop and Speedtop. The targa convertible and shooting brake were both based on the larger M8.