A small crowd, elegantly dressed in what you might call Cote d’Azur evening casual, awash in printed silk dresses and unstructured linen jackets, gathered at the legendary Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc to see … well, something. We weren’t quite sure. Audi wouldn’t say why it had brought us all to the shores of the French Riviera this summer, but it was clearly for something grand. Let me just say right off the top that Audi did not disappoint. In fact, it exceeded everyone’s expectations.
The crowd of prospective buyers for Audi’s spectacular $1-million supercar — the Nuvolari — let out a collective ooooh and aaaah as the car was unveiled. It emerged from a giant flower arrangement and drove toward the appreciative crowd. We’d bet many buyers likely placed a deposit on the spot.
Clothed in crisp carbon-fibre bodywork — you can have it painted in Titanium, like Audi’s F1 cars, or with exposed carbon — the Nuvolari is the first production car wearing Audi’s new “Radical Next” design language, penned by new chief creative officer Massimo Frascella. It’s distinctive. It’s cohesive. It’s honest in its materials — carbon, aluminum, and Alcantara — and totally refreshing in its originality. It’s also unmistakably an Audi.
“There are moments that truly define what a brand stands for,” said Frascella, and this is one of them. Design ideas first seen here, such as the surfacing, interior layout and materials, will filter through the rest of the lineup through the end of the decade.
The headline numbers are impressive: 987 horsepower from a Lamborghini-derived twin-turbo V8 plus three electric motors, 0-100 km/h in 2.6 seconds and a top speed of more than 340 km/h. Nuvolari is strictly limited to 499 examples, each priced at 590,000 euros.
Audi CEO Gernot Döllner acknowledged the brand had somewhat lost track of its identity and heritage. Nobody saw the Nuvolari coming, but it’s proof the Four Rings is back on track. Audi dropped its new supercar car like a hot mic on the Cote D’Azur and isn’t looking back.
FEATURE PHOTO COURTESY OF AUDI.
