With its exaggerated Coke-bottle shape, big Italian V12 and rich leather interior, the Espada is a weird but lovable grand tourer. Fingers crossed it's brought back.
Heritage Images/Getty Images
In the pantheon of great Lamborghinis, people bandy about names like Miura, Countach and Diablo, but rarely do they mention the Espada. If you're like most people, you probably had to Google that to find a picture of it and when you did you probably made a weird face. Well, guess what, pal? It might be coming back, kind of.
Automotive News Europe published an interview on Monday with Lamborghini boss Stefano Domenicali to talk about the success of the Urus SUV, what that could mean for a company like Lamborghini and where it might be going next. One of the things discussed was the return of Lamborghini to the exotic 2+2 grand touring segment which is currently occupied by the Ferrari GTC4Lusso, the Porsche 911 Turbo S (kind of) and not much else.
The last time that Lamborghini participated in that segment was with the Espada. Built between 1968 and 1978, the Espada was a two-door, four-seat V12-powered grand touring wagon-hatchback-shooting brake thing — it also happens to be my favorite Lamborghini by a country mile. It was relatively popular in its day by Lamborghini standards and sold more than 1,200 units during its production run.
"Our target is to reach the market between 2025 and 2027, so we are not in a hurry," said Domenicali to Automotive News Europe. "We also have to decide which would be the right powertrain in such a time frame and in a segment we have not competed in for over 40 years."
Does that mean that this hypothetical Espada would use a front-mounted V12 or V10? Or more likely some derivation of the V8 in the Urus, probably paired with some kind of hybrid system? Your bet is as good as ours here, but we're excited to see what Lamborghini does now that it's high on success and flush with SUV orders.
With its exaggerated Coke-bottle shape, big Italian V12 and rich leather interior, the Espada is a weird but lovable grand tourer. Fingers crossed it's brought back.
Heritage Images/Getty Images
In the pantheon of great Lamborghinis, people bandy about names like Miura, Countach and Diablo, but rarely do they mention the Espada. If you're like most people, you probably had to Google that to find a picture of it and when you did you probably made a weird face. Well, guess what, pal? It might be coming back, kind of.
Automotive News Europe published an interview on Monday with Lamborghini boss Stefano Domenicali to talk about the success of the Urus SUV, what that could mean for a company like Lamborghini and where it might be going next. One of the things discussed was the return of Lamborghini to the exotic 2+2 grand touring segment which is currently occupied by the Ferrari GTC4Lusso, the Porsche 911 Turbo S (kind of) and not much else.
The last time that Lamborghini participated in that segment was with the Espada. Built between 1968 and 1978, the Espada was a two-door, four-seat V12-powered grand touring wagon-hatchback-shooting brake thing — it also happens to be my favorite Lamborghini by a country mile. It was relatively popular in its day by Lamborghini standards and sold more than 1,200 units during its production run.
"Our target is to reach the market between 2025 and 2027, so we are not in a hurry," said Domenicali to Automotive News Europe. "We also have to decide which would be the right powertrain in such a time frame and in a segment we have not competed in for over 40 years."
Does that mean that this hypothetical Espada would use a front-mounted V12 or V10? Or more likely some derivation of the V8 in the Urus, probably paired with some kind of hybrid system? Your bet is as good as ours here, but we're excited to see what Lamborghini does now that it's high on success and flush with SUV orders.
