by Gauk
Tue, Oct 25, 2016 10:33 PM

Ugo Zagato (25 June 1890, Gavello - 31 October 1968) was an Italian automobile designer, known for establishing and running the Zagato coachbuilder, famous for its lightweight designs.

He had five brothers and lost his father (1905), forcing him to emigrate to Germany and metalworks employment in Köln (1905). He returned to serve in the military (1909) and joined car coachbuilder Carrozzeria Varesina in Varese, while studying at the Santa Maria design school. During World War I he moved to Torino and joined the Pomilio aircraft manufacturer, learning lightweight bodycrafting (1915–1919). He established Carrozzeria Ugo Zagato & Co., a workshop in Milano (1919), where he built close ties with Alfa Romeo. His workshop was destroyed and rebuilt as La Zagato outside Milano after World War II, joined by his sons Elio Zagato (1921–2009) in 1946, and Gianni Zagato (born 1929). His sons continued operations on Ugo Zagatos passing (1968).

Ugo Zagato was born in 1890 in the province of Rovigo, where his mother originally envisioned him taking the vows of the priesthood. Instead, Ugo became a car enthusiast. He moved to Cologne, Germany, at age 15 and undertook an apprenticeship with a coachwork firm, which may have been Utermohle. Returning to Italy in 1909, he was drafted by lottery into military service, gained contact with the Carrozzeria Varesina in Milan, and learned about light materials and bullet-like shapes while developing aircraft during World War I.Part of that transformation was Zagato's growing experience with handling and shaping metal as early warplanes moved away from using easily perforated fabric outer skins.

The war ended, and in 1919, he organized his own business, Carrozzeria Zagato, in Milan. Its first car was based on a Fiat 501 chassis. In the early 1920s, Zagato bodywork also graced products from Bianchi, Diatto and Itala, plus the 1925 Lancia Lambda. The breakthrough, however, came when Zagato developed a steady alliance with Alfa Romeo.In the European circles that really counted, Alfa and Zagato were literally an A-to-Z tale of greatness and of making each other's reputations. Zagato was personally close to engineer and designer Vittorio Jano, who had newly jumped from Fiat to Alfa, and whose P2 had already run the table on the Grand Prix circuit for two straight years.

They discussed the follow-on creation of an exceptional car for Alfa. Jano created the chassis and the 1,498cc monobloc straight-six. Zagato did the featherweight bodywork, which from some angles recalled--or even predated--lavish American classic shapes from Kissel or Duesenberg.

This was the Alfa Romeo 6C 1500, a great leap forward at the zenith of European automobiles. The amazingly attractive car was followed up by the Alfa 1750, whose prototype won the 1928 Mille Miglia in its first race attempt. These sporting Alfas were produced through 1932, by which time Zagato was already experimenting with radically sloped frontal glass and headlamps faired into the front bodywork.

His next great platform following Jano's early Alfa came in 1937 when the Fiat Topolino arrived. Zagato, long a fanatic for lightness, was struck by its drilled-out, cross-braced chassis channels. It was his kind of car.Zagato won a big contract to build cabs for Isotta-Fraschini trucks, but the Milan plant was bombed in 1943. After the war, he had a vision of rapid expansion via custom-bodied cars based on the Topolino's successor, the Fiat 500, and then, the 1100. By this time, his sons Elio (born 1921) and Gianni (1929) were in the family business.

Elio ran a critically successful early project, the 1947 Panoramica, with Zagato producing cars on Fiat 750, 1100 and 1400 bases into the 1950s. It also styled the Frank Costin-designed Maserati 450S of 1957.Arguably, Zagato's best-looking and most famous modern car was another Alfa Romeo, the GTZ coupe of 1962, built on the Giulia chassis.

While Zagato bodied its share of Ferraris and Aston Martins, the house's more enduring fame comes from its relationship with Lancia (Appia, Flaminia, Fulvia) and the gentlemanly British marque Bristol, for whose 412 Zagato created a drophead body.Ugo Zagato died in 1968. Elio, who created the double-bubble Zagato roof, died in 2009. The company is now in the hands of Elio's son, Andrea, and Andrea's wife, Marella, the daughter of Piero Rivolta and granddaughter of Iso founder Renzo Rivolta.

Article Credit: Hemmings

published by Gauk