2002 Alfa Romeo Brera Concept

The merits of maturity

Long since in the mind of the world of automotive shape and body design are sensations of unrest, frenzy and discontent, fuelled by the pervasive desire for innovation and glamour.

Encouraged by clientele to venture into domains where only the sky is the limit or spurred by unexpressed consumer yearnings besieged by endless inputs from the world of media, fashion, cult and one-step-ahead social trends, feeling the delight of sheer and supreme style to the fingertips goes beyond the restraints of time for Italdesign Giugiaro.

It is an acceleration that embraces creative thinking, technology, manufacturing and the market. We barely percept the rapid pace to which we are susceptible: we have metabolized it.

In the Alfa Romeo Brera concept car, Giorgetto Giugiaro has called together the essence of creative thinking, shaped around the concept of a contemporary, elegant, refined and essential car, capable of grasping that spirit of adventure and pursuit of quality that runs through the Alfa brand and its history like a golden thread and carving out technological evolution that translates into a unique synthesis of almost intimate and intentionally reserved driving pleasure; requisites that make their statement through classic appeal and elegant lines, designed to weather the toll of time.

Arising therefrom is the head-turning prototype that Giugiaro would like to board on the last day of the Show, taking the roads of Geneva in his stride to mingle among city traffic knowing to arouse emotion and thrills.

Alfa Romeo Brera

With the Alfa Romeo Brera concept car, Italdesign and Giorgetto Giugiaro drew inspiration from the themes of coachbuilder predecessors in their heydays, favoring those architectonic tracks paved in the years of the past, essential, immediately legible or releasing the ambitions of the materials (bodyshell entirely in carbon fiber) and its content, a powerful 90° V-shaped mid-front eight-cylinder engine of more than 4,000 cm3 with almost 400 HP.

The shape of the Alfa – a two-seater plus room for two children – is generous and complete. Integrated front and rear ends with seamless bumper – a refined and tailored interpretation of the legendary sports cars of the past endowed with state-ofart mechanics arising from the co-development of Alfa Romeo motorsport components - a solid body with striking road grip thanks to Transax mechanics, made even more convincing and dynamic by a perfect balance of tyres and suspension, an all-new gearbox of the latest generation.

As a result of the technology currently available, these integrated treatments – with recourse to aluminum – also go into series production projects.

The design of Alfa Romeo Brera body is generous both in length and width, 4,388 mm and 1,894 mm, respectively, with a height of 1,289 mm, whilst the distinctively tapered front and rear ends attribute a compact unique character.

As for the cars of the Fifties, the hollow-shaped bonnet slopes downward to the distinctive emblem badge that characterizes the brand identity. The V-shaped profiles converging into fascinating headlights and parking lights are modeled by the downward sloping bonnet.

The bodyshell of the underlying structure pointed the way to fitting air intakes as near to the ground as possible.

For normal inspections, the line of the bonnet culminates in the raised contour that descends from the windshield board to the emblematic badge. For more drastic interventions, the whole of the front can be removed by dismantling the belt band that descends vertically from the curvature ends.

The one and only hedonistic concession is represented by the door aperture fitted with fixed windows and operated by a patented rotary and push knob. When rotated outward, the door is projected upward. The lower center of rotation (aligned to the lower part of the door) works towards pruning the high-opening door, which protrudes 360 mm only from the unitary body, a somewhat impossible space for unrestricted passenger egress from a conventional door. In truth, this represents an unrelated concession to the mission posed by creative thinking so that the production of vehicle becomes immediately feasible. This may be easily overcome without detriment to the lines of the door by employing a normal hinged flap.

In the _ rear view, the fender line fades away at the base of the rear window. The rear end design themes draw inspiration from the latest Alfa 156 and 157 stylish features, which, however, Giugiaro blended together recalling the modeled rear window of the legendary Giulietta Sprint.

As once again proposed by the V-shaped headlight and parking light convergence, the tail of the car accordingly descends evenly without truncating abruptly from the front. With no baggage compartment, stocking is enabled by raising the one and only hinged rear window inserted in the dark spoiler that houses the stoplights.

Interior in line with technological trend

If the question of classic appeal applies to exterior design, the task of conferring a standard-setting look and futuristic design to a model encompassing powerful technology is assigned to interior architecture, which proposes the introduction of aluminum components made “warmer” and more comfortable by leather padding, control display separation, prominent central tunnel and a generous console set between the two passengers.

The door panel recuperates shoulder and elbow space due to the lack of roll-down windows. Air intakes are fitted on the door opening and not at the dashboard angles. The seating configuration allows glimpses of the steel structure to be valorized. As mentioned earlier, all metal parts placed near to the knees or shoulders of the driver or passengers are well protected and padded. Engine power and performance pointed the way to the application of two handles per passenger: one on the door and one on the tunnel. Interior lighting is regulated by an innovative system of sensors that regulate the darkness of the large upper window.

Hi-fi System

Fitted with PICASOUND created by Pierre Piccaluga, the Alfa Romeo Brera incorporates a revolutionary breakthrough that translates into the perfection of integrated sound. Drawing on one-step-ahead technology in terms of audio signal coding for a tridimensional effect and studies on solid-borne noise, Piccaluga simplifies this with all-new innovation creating, at the same time, an unrivalled sound-on standard never before attained. Its research source is a heady synthesis of quintessential physics and biological know-how, the combination of which paves the way to new fields of exploration and inventions. Sound motors without movable parts, only particles of air dancing as they’ve always danced in the past. The faultless sound-intensity level is pure and dynamic. For the first time, there is harmonic density. This is accomplished by means of an electric potential and a “leaner” number of components. Without acoustic distortion, efficiency mirrors a 60% enhancement never before known. Applied strictly to these breakthroughs are fundamental acoustic propagation laws.

Michelin

The Michelin Pax System perfectly supplements the concept car’s carving out technological evolution with a sports sculptured tyres particularly suitable for high performances.

“This is a flower about to bloom and not a tormented spirit”

This is the definition given by Giorgetto Giugiaro when last revisiting a model put in place by the “biscione”, the Carmaker with crucial stepping stones along its entrepreneurial and creative life, from the Alfasud project to the current day and from the Caimano prototype to the Scighera.

“This can easily flaunt 4x4 mechanics and chassis. With Mantovani, we have created it for production, complete with feasibility pre-studies: apart from the doors, nothing utopian. Every once in a while, a showcasing prototype like a series program focused around the shorter period.”

TECHNICAL FEATURES

Length: 4,388 mm

Width: 1,894 mm

Height: 1,289 mm

Front track: 909 mm

Rear track: 884 mm

Wheelbase: 2,595 mm

Front overhang: 1,588 mm

Rear overhang: 1,573 mm

Engine: V 8 front-longitudinal Alfa Romeo

Displacement: more than 4,000 cm3

Power: 400 HP at 7,000 rpm