Ugo Zagato built fighter planes before he built car bodies. In 1919 he opened his own coachworks in Milan to make cars as light as aircraft, and the company still signs its work with what it calls the lightning Z badge.
- Country
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Italy - Active
- Since 1919
- Founded by
- Ugo Zagato
- Website
- Official website ↗
From fighter planes to Milanese racing bodies
Before Ugo Zagato built a single car body, he built aircraft. During the First World War he headed a team at Ansaldo Pomilio, where SVA and Savoia Pomilio fighter planes were assembled. His contract asked for three planes a month. According to Zagato, his planning pushed output to 60.
On 19 April 1919 he set up on his own in Milan as Carrozzeria Artigiana Ugo Zagato, building and repairing bodies for cars and aircraft. The idea was simple and, at the time, radical. Cars were bulky and heavy. Zagato wanted to build them like aeroplanes: light structures with a thin aluminium shell, strong but never wasteful. The company carries his surname to this day.
The road wasn’t smooth. On the night of 13 August 1943 an RAF raid destroyed the coachworks on Corso Sempione. Ugo started again, first in Saronno and then back in Milan near the Alfa Romeo works at Portello. In 1962 his son Elio moved the business to a new factory at Terrazzano di Rho, on the edge of Milan. In the early 1990s Marella and Andrea Zagato took the helm and turned the firm into what it calls a Total Design Studio.
The lightning Z
Zagato’s own history has a name for its badge. Twice it calls it “the lightning Z badge”, and it says that in the 1960s buyers chose a car wearing it for the coachwork and its function, whatever engine sat underneath.
The mark on Zagato’s official site is a square with a sharp, stepped Z cut into it, a shape that really does look like a bolt of lightning. Below sits the name ZAGATO in serif capitals. For the 2019 centenary press material the logo was set on a deep bordeaux background.
What the Z stands for is plain: it is the initial of the family name. What Zagato doesn’t say is who first drew the badge or when it first appeared, so we won’t guess either.
A roof built for two
If the Z is the signature, the double bubble is the handwriting. When Aston Martin announced the DB7 Zagato in 2002, Zagato listed the features it saw as classic to its cars: the radiator grille, the bluff tail and the “double bubble” roof. The name says it all: a roof shaped like two bubbles side by side.
Other people’s chassis, Zagato’s shape
Zagato rarely put its name on a car alone. By its own count, it worked with 44 car brands in its first century and created more than 440 special-bodied models. Alfa Romeo was the main partner in the first fifty years, Aston Martin in the second.
Landmark Zagatos, decade by decade
- 1930: Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 Zagato. Driven by Tazio Nuvolari, Achille Varzi, Giuseppe Campari and Pietro Ghersi, Zagato-bodied 1750s took the first four places in that year’s Mille Miglia.
- 1949: Ferrari 166 MM Panoramica. Built for Antonio Stagnoli, it showed off Zagato’s post-war Panoramica idea, with glass curving up into the roof.
- 1955: Fiat 8V Zagato. Elio Zagato drove one to victory at Avus, beating two Alfa Romeo 1900 SS Zagatos and twelve Porsche 356s.
- 1960: Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato. Shown at the London Motor Show and built in 19 examples over two years, it began a partnership that still runs today.
- 1969: Alfa Romeo Junior Z. First shown at the Turin Motor Show, a wedge-shaped coupe of which only 402 were made.
- 1989: Alfa Romeo S.Z. The star of that year’s Geneva show, built in 1,000 units and, according to Zagato, for many years the last true rear-wheel-drive Alfa Romeo coupe.
- 2011: Alfa Romeo TZ3 Corsa. A one-off made to celebrate Alfa Romeo’s centenary, followed by nine TZ3 Stradale cars.
The list of clients runs much longer. Zagato built the Sport versions in the Lancia catalogue in the 1960s, won the Compasso d’Oro design prize in 1960 for the Fiat Abarth 1000 Zagato, and later created the Raptor with a Lamborghini V12 and the Mostro powered by Maserati. Paths sometimes crossed with Turin’s Pininfarina too. When the Maserati A6G production car appeared in 1947 with a Pininfarina body, the prototype chassis went to Zagato.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Zagato logo mean?
The Z is the initial of the founder’s surname. Zagato itself calls the badge “the lightning Z”, after its sharp, stepped shape, but it hasn’t published a fuller explanation or the name of its designer.
Who founded Zagato and when?
Ugo Zagato founded the company in Milan on 19 April 1919, after four years building military aircraft at Ansaldo Pomilio during the First World War.
What is a Zagato double bubble roof?
A roof shaped like two bubbles side by side, as the name suggests. Zagato names it, along with the grille and the bluff tail, as one of the classic features of its cars.
Where is Zagato based?
In the Milan area, where it has been since 1919. Its Atelier is at Via Arese in Rho, the site the company moved to in 1962.
Fuselages to fuoriserie: the Zagato dossier
- Founded
- 1919
- Founder
- Ugo Zagato
- Country
- Italy
- Headquarters
- Milan, Italy
- Current emblem
- A stepped, lightning-shaped Z cut into a square above the ZAGATO name in serif capitals
- Known for
- Lightweight special bodies for Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin and many other makers
- Website
- Official website ↗
