Automotive

Lamborghini selfishly celebrates 50 years with Egoista concept

Lamborghini selfishly celebrates 50 years with Egoista concept
The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
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The Egoista's open rear-end reduces weight and gives an aggressive look
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The Egoista's open rear-end reduces weight and gives an aggressive look
The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
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The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
The Egoista's single-person cockpit
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The Egoista's single-person cockpit
Lamborghini compares the front to a trimaran
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Lamborghini compares the front to a trimaran
The cockpit was heavily inspired by aircraft
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The cockpit was heavily inspired by aircraft
Active flaps improve aerodynamics
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Active flaps improve aerodynamics
Designers sought to create the look of a charging bull with their bodywork
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Designers sought to create the look of a charging bull with their bodywork
The Egoista is a part of Lamborghini's 50th anniversary celebration
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The Egoista is a part of Lamborghini's 50th anniversary celebration
The Egoista uses a body and rims made from special anti-radar material and anti-glare glass with an orange gradation
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The Egoista uses a body and rims made from special anti-radar material and anti-glare glass with an orange gradation
Selfishness gets tangible
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Selfishness gets tangible
“It's as if Ferruccio Lamborghini were saying: I'm going to put the engine in the back, I don't want a passenger," De Silva described.
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“It's as if Ferruccio Lamborghini were saying: I'm going to put the engine in the back, I don't want a passenger," De Silva described.
The debut included a model in a flight suit piloting the car across a "landing strip"
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The debut included a model in a flight suit piloting the car across a "landing strip"
The Egoista debuts
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The Egoista debuts
The Egoista makes a flashy entrance
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The Egoista makes a flashy entrance
Lamborghini's celebration included a Grand Tour of 350 vehicles
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Lamborghini's celebration included a Grand Tour of 350 vehicles
The Lamborghini 50th Anniversary Grande Giro traveled 745 miles (1,200 km) through Italy
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The Lamborghini 50th Anniversary Grande Giro traveled 745 miles (1,200 km) through Italy
350 vehicles participated in the multi-day Grand Tour from Milan to Bologna
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350 vehicles participated in the multi-day Grand Tour from Milan to Bologna
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Are those folks impressed by the Egoista or frightened of it?
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Are those folks impressed by the Egoista or frightened of it?
Lamborghini makes some noise for 50 years
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Lamborghini makes some noise for 50 years
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Many a Countach came out to celebrate
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Many a Countach came out to celebrate
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
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Lamborghinis from every era tackled the 745 miles (1,200 km)
Lamborghini owners from 29 countries participated
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Lamborghini owners from 29 countries participated
Lamborghini owners from 29 countries participated
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Lamborghini owners from 29 countries participated
Controversial - That's about the nicest way we can describe Lamborghini's 50th anniversary efforts. Just two months after showing the Veneno - already arguably the most extreme(ly ugly) concept in its history, Lamborghini pushes the boundaries even further. The Egoista concept is even more out there in its design.
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Controversial - That's about the nicest way we can describe Lamborghini's 50th anniversary efforts. Just two months after showing the Veneno - already arguably the most extreme(ly ugly) concept in its history, Lamborghini pushes the boundaries even further. The Egoista concept is even more out there in its design.
A Lamborghini Countach makes its way through town
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A Lamborghini Countach makes its way through town
Lamborghinis from every era
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Lamborghinis from every era
The festivities included a Concours d’Elegance at Piazza Maggiore in Bologna
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The festivities included a Concours d’Elegance at Piazza Maggiore in Bologna
The festivities included a Concours d’Elegance at Piazza Maggiore in Bologna
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The festivities included a Concours d’Elegance at Piazza Maggiore in Bologna
A Lamborghini Countach
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A Lamborghini Countach
Lamborghini celebrates 50 years with flare
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Lamborghini celebrates 50 years with flare
The Egoista debuts
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The Egoista debuts
50 years of Lamborghini
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50 years of Lamborghini
The Egoista debuts
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The Egoista debuts
The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
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The Egoista debuts to celebrate Lamborghini's 50th anniversary
View gallery - 44 images

Controversial – that's about the nicest way we can describe Lamborghini's 50th anniversary efforts on the concept car front. Just two months after showing the Veneno – arguably the most extreme(ly ugly) concept in its history – Lamborghini pushes the boundaries even further. The surprise Egoista concept is even more out there in design.

Making its debut this past weekend during Lamborghini's 50th anniversary celebration, the Egoista looks like the work of a creative (or deranged) design student. But it's actually a sort of birthday "gift" from Lambo's parent company, with Volkswagen Group design chief Walter De Silva leading the team that created the radical concept.

The scene of the weekend debut was "emotional," according to Lamborghini. What specific emotions were involved is left to our imaginations, and shock, disbelief, anger, and maybe a tad of abandonment and rage on the part of onlookers comes to mind.

Lamborghini borrowed from the Gallardo in giving the Egoista a 600-hp version of its 5.2-liter V10 engine. It didn't provide any additional powertrain or performance specifications, treating the Egoista more like a design study.

Even without translating "egoista" from Italian to English (it means "selfish"), the name conveys a certain sense of hubris and self indulgence, as in "whoever drives this assault on the pupils must be dominated by ego." To emphasize that selfishness, the car features a tiny cockpit enveloping a single driver.

The Egoista debuts
The Egoista debuts

De Silva explained the self-indulgent Egoista demographic further: "“This is a car made for one person only, to allow them to have fun and express their personality to the maximum. It is designed purely for hyper-sophisticated people who want only the most extreme and special things in the world. It represents hedonism taken to the extreme, it is a car without compromises, in a word: egoista (selfish)."

The single-person cockpit was inspired by the Apache helicopter, which has an emergency ejection feature. While the Egoista won't project its driver skywards to safety, De Silva's VW design team took pains to clearly delineate the cockpit from the exterior of the vehicle. It includes a single racing seat with four-point harness and a jet-fighter-like head-up display.

"The cockpit, made completely of carbon fiber and aluminum, represents a sort of survival cell, allowing the driver to isolate and protect themselves from external elements," De Silva said."We kept an eye on the future when designing the Egoista, with the idea that its cockpit could have been taken from a jet aircraft and integrated into a road vehicle, to provide a different travel option."

The Egoista's single-person cockpit
The Egoista's single-person cockpit

The glass enclosure slides open electronically, and getting in and out of the driver's seat requires a bit of technique. To get out, the driver must remove the steering wheel and place it on the dashboard, stand up on his seat, sit down on the labeled area of the body and swivel his way to solid ground. He can't stray too far because the body is covered with "do not walk zones" also inspired by aeronautical design.

You wouldn't be alone in thinking that the Egoista crosses the line of good taste in taking Lamborghini's recent angular styling to an extreme level, much like the Veneno concept before it. The cow-spearing, triple-pronged front-end, in particular, is simply not fit to carry the Raging Bull shield on its misshapen beak. It comes off as different for the sake of being different, certainly not attractive.

Lamborghini compares the front to a trimaran
Lamborghini compares the front to a trimaran

If you can manage to ignore that messy front-end for a second – a big if – the picture gets slightly, but not much, better as your eye wanders down the flank. Lamborghini says that the sides were designed to emulate a bull lowering its horns and preparing to charge. That sounds great in a press release, and maybe you can see it if you stare at it like an abstract painting, but a less purposeful glimpse will give you a busy series of lines and shapes competing against each other for no particular reason.

The upper profile is a bit more straightforward and honest. The tiny cockpit shoved all the way to the front emphasizes the concept's single-occupant design, and the long, slowly descending roof line puts a focus over the car's engine. When taken within the context of Lamborghini's 50th anniversary, that layout serves as a sort of homage to many decades of mid-engine innovation and design.

In contrast to the Veneno and its huge rear wing, the Egoista was designed without "aerodynamic appendages." Instead, it uses a series of active flaps that automatically open and close based on driving conditions. Its aeronautically inspired "LED clearance lights" were designed to give it three-dimensional definition at night. That light set includes two white front lights, two red rear lights, a red flashing light in the upper part of the tail, two orange bull's eyes as side markers, and a left red and right green on the roof. A pair of xenon headlamps hidden behind the front air intakes casts a beam on the road ahead.

The Egoista's narrow future takes its inherent selfishness even further. It is a gift for Lamborghini from Lamborghini (or for VW from VW, if you'd prefer), and the gift-giver/recipient has no plans of selling the one-of-a-kind car. It will remain a part of Lambo's own collection, no matter how many self-absorbed megalomaniacs one-up each other with crazy bids to buy it.

Source: Lamborghini

View gallery - 44 images
25 comments
25 comments
ikinone
I don't see how you are writing this so blatantly subjectively without acknowledging it.
I think it looks amazing. I am quite sure many other people will too. You are just making yourself look close-minded.
Gearhead
It's appalling! I love it! This is what Italians do so well- who else but an Italian can wear a white suit with white slip-on shoes & pull it off! If only I were hyper-sophisticated instead of just sophisticated, I would own one in a heartbeat. And I would rock a pair of white leather slip on shoes, too.
Marcus Carr
All those overlapping plates remind me of an armadillo.
Nairda
The nose and rear sections look like they can comfortably accommodate a VTOL. To go with the look of course.
Would be disappointing to see this thing putting around town just as it is boring to see a fighter jet parking in the hanger after it has landed.
RaVOLT
I cannot afford it but it is stunning for a toy! Imagine an electric drive train developed by Tesla Motors in it!!! :)
Arahant
I think it looks cool, especialy the interior its kinda awesome. I guess different tastes. But i think this is best off as a one off.
At this point when it comes to fast super-cars, they've pretty much done everything design wise and with making cars aerodynamic. Pretty much every new car for the last 5-10 years looks like cars that have come before it, so its hard to come up with something truely unique. They obviously modeled it after like a jet-fighter or as the article says apache helicopter, and i think they did a good job.
I think one of the perks of owning or being one of the executives of a company like this, that's in charge with this sort of thing, is being able to create something that speaks to you without having to make everyone happy about it.
SeekerFinder
But will Bruce Wayne sue?
Guy Macher
I love it! Would you need a jet pilot rating to drive it?
Michael Wilson
I love it. The lunacy is back! this is what lambo has always been about. Their cars were always visually striking and fast, but were usually more concerned with turning heads, rather than turning corners. After the germans bought them out, lambos became more reliable, faster, more sensible but also a bit boring. Seeing all these wonderful, zany, wacky concepts looks like a return to the great old head turning Lambos like the Countach, the Miura and the Diablo.
Slowburn
It reminds me of Speed Racer's Mach 5.
I think it was intended for the track but turned out to handle like a pregnant sow.
Oddly enough the Apache gunship seats 2 and occasionally carries passengers externally.
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