From concept to reality: the world's greatest show cars

Concepts are designed to gauge public reaction and pave the way for new ideas - here are the best

Concept cars exist to show off cutting-edge designs and technologies that will eventually be woven into the fabric of some of the most important cars on the road.

Serving as a forward-thinking statement of intent for their respective companies, concept cars are often more newsworthy and exciting than the machines that actually make it into showrooms a few years later. Some, however, are more influential than others.

Strap in, then, and take a look at the greatest, most outlandish concept cars we've seen at the world's biggest motor shows and events.

*Alfa Romeo 2uettottanta*

Catchy, no? Well, ‘2uettottanta’ might roll off the tongue more smoothly if you’re from Turin. Pininfarina’s 80th birthday present to itself in 2010 imagined a reborn Duetto, giving an enticing vision of what an MX-5 rival from Alfa Romeo could look like. Too good to be true? Yes, but we got the 4C three years later, and that was just as beautiful.

*Bentley Java*

A more affordable ‘baby’ Bentley with a thumping V8 engine and a removable roof? Not so outlandish a concept in 2023 given that the Continental GT’s strong sales have kept the lights on in Crewe for two decades now. 

But back in 1994 the very idea was near-unfathomable – until the reveal of the Java, that is. 

This imposing luxury cabriolet was the headline act at that year’s Geneva motor show, but, despite looking near-ready for the showrooms, it was presented by then-owner Rolls-Royce as a pure concept, and one they openly said would probably need its underpinnings supplied by a partner if it were to be productionised. 

The Sultan of Brunei, though – not one to take no for an answer – had some 18 Javas built, based on the E34 BMW 5 Series, in estate, coupé and convertible body styles.

*BMW E1*

At the 1993 Frankfurt motor show, BMW bosses suggested the eventual production version of the electric E1 hatchback could be on sale in just four years, but it would use an 1100cc motorcycle engine. 

Wrong on both counts: the E1’s most obvious successor, the i3, wouldn’t land until 2013, by which point electric drivetrains were sufficiently advanced that it could, in fact, shun petrol power for a plug. 

This was actually the second iteration of the E1, which added a small-capacity petrol engine to the equation for a longer range to create a format that would be revived for the range-extender i3 in 2016.

*Ford Probe III*

“If Ford’s new research vehicle is anything to judge by, the days of the great cliff fronts, slab corners and boxy shapes will no longer feature in the next generation of cars,” we proclaimed when the Probe III. was revealed in 1981. Well, quite. 

This wind-cheating prototype was designed to ‘probe’ the limits of vehicular aerodynamics in a bid to win the efficiency race while still providing Cortina levels of space and comfort, and it represented a radical departure from the staid and straight-edged saloons that had preceded it. 

Its windows were flush with the bodywork (like an airliner), its super-slippery wheels were wrapped in bespoke 145-section tyres and it had a gigantic scoop at the front to send air under the smoothed-off underbelly. 

It gave clues to what could be expected from the long-awaited Cortina replacement, which would arrive the year after wearing the Sierra nameplate and bearing no small resemblance to the Probe III.

*Hyundai 45*

“It won’t look like that, surely…”. No way would Hyundai’s first bespoke EV resemble the outrageous, aggressive 45 concept the Korean brand showed at Frankfurt in 2019. 

Not safe, sensible old Hyundai. And so it was through another mouthful of our favourite hats that we would praise head designer Sangyup Lee in 2020 for the production Ioniq 5’s loyalty to the striking show car that came before. 

“The 45 signifies a new beginning, so we looked at the beginning of our company,” said Lee of the 45, which was designed as a futuristic reworking of the 1975 Pony hatchback.

*Kia Imagine*

Car makers don’t often take the mickey out of each other, but Kia did a nice job of satirising the industry’s infatuation with digitisation by arranging no fewer than 21 screens haphazardly across the dashboard of the bold Imagine concept.

The move was, it said, a “humorous riposte”. Well, we laughed. And it served as an enticing taste of a bold new design language that would become reality with the EV6 only a year later.

*Lamborghini Cheetah*

Lamborghini broke the internet only this year with the rally-ready Huracán Sterrato – but it wasn’t the first time the marque had toyed with the idea of an off-road supercar. 

Remember the LM002? That Countach-engined super-truck was one of the most outlandish cars of the 1980s – no small feat in itself – but did you know it evolved from a one-off, open-doored prototype that Lamborghini designed for the US military? 

Ultimately, poor handling and an asthmatic Chrysler engine (180bhp from 5.9 litres…) made it unfit for action, and GM’s similarly styled Humvee won the contract.

*Land Rover DC100*

It was designed as a vision of what a reborn Land Rover Defender could look like, but there were signs it could eventually reach showrooms as an entry-level ‘leisure’ Land Rover, slotting below the Freelander. 

Alas, this 4.3m baby Landie would be consigned to the history books, but its legacy lives on as plans for a smaller new Defender finally take shape. Watch this space.

*Mazda MX-81*

Today we have the MX-30 EV and, of course, the legendary MX-5, but Mazda’s now storied ‘MX’ badge was first applied to a game-changing one-off that was revealed at the 1981 Turin motor show. 

The MX-81 Aria (MX standing for ‘Mazda Experimental’) was designed by Bertone to “deliver new values without being confined by convention”, according to Mazda. 

The concept featured a TV screen in the dashboard, seats that rotated and windows so massive you could grow tomatoes in the cabin (we reckon). 

It never saw showrooms but set the tone for the innovation that would come to define Mazda’s flagship production cars.

*Porsche Boxster concept*

Porsche is in rude health today, clocking mammoth sales figures and chunky upticks in profit financial quarter upon financial quarter. 

But things weren’t always so rosy in Zuffenhausen: in the mid-1990s, Porsche’s line-up comprised the 32-year-old 911, the 18-year-old 928 and the 968, which was fundamentally an evolution of the 944 that was launched in 1982. Production costs were high while sales were sliding. 

Salvation, as we no know, came in the form of the Boxster, which, at 26 years old, remains one of the marque’s best-selling and most revered products. 

It was revealed in concept form at the Detroit motor show in 1993, where we noted the influence of the legendary 550 Spyder, the pleasing links with the 911 and the eye-popping £25,000 target price.

*How to build a concept car*

Irrespective of their commercial importance or notional production-readiness, concept cars tend to be constructed from wood, clay and glassfibre – materials that require no specialist factory tooling to shape and which can be moulded into a suitably show-stopping silhouette at short notice and minimal cost. 

But that’s not to say less care goes into their construction than it does for any production car; far from it, in fact. A few months before Caterham unwrapped the internet-rousing Project V concept at Goodwood, I went out to Italdesign’s headquarters in Turin to see how the project was coming along. 

At this point – just a few weeks out from the Festival of Speed – the car didn’t exist as a physical entity, but I was able to ‘sit inside’ and take a good look around the exterior, courtesy of a super-slick VR headset that imposed a full-scale CGI representation on the studio floor in front of me. 

Meanwhile, in the next room, Project V designer Anthony Jannarelly was working flat out with the Italdesign team to finalise upholstery colours, grille surround treatments and wheel designs. 

At one point I was invited to join a (fairly large) group of designers in the car park to evaluate how changes in lighting angle and intensity affected the look of the chosen paint scheme. 

We shuffled around a shiny swatch panel on the floor, nodding and murmuring knowledgeably as individual flecks of paint reacted to the clouds moving overhead – well, that’s what they all did; I just said I liked green cars. 

A month later I returned to find the car all but complete, right down to the mocked-up infotainment display and central rear seat, but it still needed paint and trim, and my opinion was (startlingly) still valuable to them: what did I think of this steering wheel boss, that dashboard topper, or the other seat adjustment lever? 

It’s an exhausting and illuminating process, and worth it almost solely for the small spark of joy I got at Goodwood in July when I spotted the dashboard stitching in the final car was the colour I had chosen (or, at least, they let me think I had).