Turin Motor Show 1965: the chassis that ignited the Miura legend

In Turin, in November 1965, it is not a car that captures the attention of the public, but a chassis. Bare, essential: made of folded sheet metal lightened by numerous drilled openings. On it sits a 4-litre V12 engine mounted transversely in the rear. It looks like a racing prototype, yet it is the foundation from which the Miura will be born. Displayed at the Lamborghini stand at the Turin Motor Show, it reveals to everyone the pure mechanical essence of the next production car from Sant’Agata Bolognese. It is a declaration of intent, a radical gesture marking the beginning of a new era. It is an iconic moment in the history of Lamborghini which, in 2026, prepares to celebrate sixty years since the Miura’s debut with a year of festivities and an official Polo Storico tour, paying tribute to the world’s first supercar.

The first idea for what would become the architecture of the new Lamborghini emerged in the summer of 1964, born from the intuition and courage of three young members of the Lamborghini team in Sant’Agata Bolognese: Giampaolo Dallara, Paolo Stanzani and test driver Bob Wallace. Just over twenty-years old, they shared the dream of bringing Lamborghini into the world of racing. Since this was not part of Ferruccio Lamborghini’s plans, they decided that if their cars could not go onto the track, the track would come to the road cars, bringing performance, technology and emotion with it. This idea gave shape to project L105, which first took form as a light and compact chassis ready to host an extreme and revolutionary gran turismo body. Initially sceptical, Ferruccio Lamborghini chose to trust them, and the P400 chassis and engine became reality: a manifesto of creative freedom and technical avant-garde.

Presented at the Turin Motor Show on 3 November 1965, alongside the 350 GT and 350 GTS, the chassis appeared painted in satin black with four white exhaust pipes. The period reports described it as the skeleton of a car ready to race, emphasizing the originality of its technical configuration. The structure, built by Marchesi of Modena, was made from 0.8-millimetre steel sheet, folded and drilled to ensure lightness and rigidity. A central tub served as the load-bearing element and mounting base for the suspension, while two auxiliary front and rear subframes supported mechanical components, suspension and accessories. The total weight did not exceed 120 kilograms, a remarkable result for the era. Independent double-wishbone suspension, Girling disc brakes and Borrani wire wheels completed the technical package, with solutions borrowed from racing and never-before seen on a road-going car.

Its distinctive feature was the unprecedented integration of engine and gearbox into a single compact unit mounted behind the cabin. This solution reduced size and defined a completely new powertrain architecture. Completing the technical spectacle were the twelve vertical inlet trumpets of the Weber carburetors, a powerful visual statement of an engineering concept pushed to the extreme.

The chassis captivated both public and press: a static, engineless prototype became the focus of the motor show. In those days, the most important Italian coachbuilders stopped by the Lamborghini stand. Initially presented to Carrozzeria Touring as project “Tigre,” before its public reveal in Turin, the Miura chassis arrived at the show without a body. Touring, which had built the 350 and 400 GT, proposed its own design, but financial difficulties clouded future collaboration. Pininfarina, bound to other manufacturers, could not commit to the Sant’Agata marque, and the opportunity was seized by Nuccio Bertone. 

According to legend, Bertone arrived at the stand near the end of the show and was greeted by Ferruccio with a joke: “You are the last of the coachbuilders to show up.” Bertone examined the chassis and replied that his atelier would create “the perfect shoe for this wonderful foot.” Whether the dialogue happened exactly this way is uncertain, but the story highlights the immediate understanding between the two. From that encounter came the decision to entrust Bertone with the bodywork of the future Lamborghini. During the Christmas holidays, with the factory closed, the first sketches were shown to Ferruccio, Dallara and Stanzani. The lines were so innovative that they were immediately approved as the definitive project. 

In March 1966, at the Geneva Motor Show, the P400 chassis shown in Turin took its final form and became the legendary Miura. Sixty years later, this model will celebrate its anniversary in 2026, but its origins lie there: in a satin-black structure, with four white exhausts, twelve vertical carburetor trumpets and the bold decision to show the world not the bodywork, but what lay beneath. In that moment, Lamborghini transformed an audacious idea into reality and paved the way for a legend that would never fade.

In 2026, Automobili Lamborghini will dedicate a full year of celebrations and an official Polo Storico tour to the Miura: a tribute to a model that forever changed the world of super sports cars, creating a new language of style and performance. It was a car so revolutionary that it gave birth to a term that did not exist before: “supercar,” specifically coined by an English journalist to describe it.

Lamborghini Miura