Alfa Romeo GTV EV with SZ-style looks in the works
Alfa tees up new GTV. Designers are working on an electric coupé that couldcome out in 2026 with looks based on the striking SZ.
SCOP – NEW ALFA ROMEO COUPE – THE RADICAL PLAN FOR A GTV REVIVAL
A long-awaited replacement for the Alfa Romeo GTV coupé could arrive as soon as 2026, after the Italian brand’s chief designer confirmed that design work is continuing behind the scenes.
It is not yet officially part of the product plan, but if Alfa Romeo’s corporate fortunes continue to improve as they have over the past 18 months, the GTV could be added to its list of new-model releases in 2026 or 2027 (by which time the marque’s line-up will be all-electric), Alejandro Mesonero-Romanos hinted to Drives-Today.
The GTV isn’t to be confused with the low-volume sports car that Alfa Romeo is set to unveil later this year (see box, right). That takes inspiration from the 1967 33 Stradale, which is commonly thought of as the most beautiful Alfa Romeo ever designed.
Mesonero-Romanos wouldn’t reveal if the prospective new car, which might most easily be thought of as a Giulia coupé, is more likely to come to market badged as a GTV or perhaps even as an Alfetta. But he did say that he had been spending a lot of time surveying the unconventional form of the iconic SZ coupé of 1989 and had been inspired by it.
“This wasn’t a beautiful car, we all know,” he commented, “but there’s a lot we can take from its distinctiveness and independence of spirit when we think about designing a coupé for the electric age. “I loved its wedge profile, its square tail and the way the dark glasshouse just bubbles out of this great mass of body. “It’s a brutal design but such a special, impactful one, and we need to emulate it if we can.” That task won’t be easy, however, using Alfa Romeo parent company Stellantis’s next-generation EV platform, as this is of the skateboard style that tends to impose higher-profile bodies, long wheelbases, short overhangs and challenging proportions.
“It’s often said that EV technology is freeing for designers because there are no rules and no restrictions,” said Mesonero-Romanos, “but the truth is we have even more restrictions and challenges with skateboard platforms than we did with ICE ones. “There are ways we can offset the extra height that an underfloor battery adds to a car [as Porsche did with the Taycan’s ‘foot garage’ battery cutouts], but we have to fight for every few millimetres when it comes to roofline height and hip point. “And that’s what we’re doing. Some fights we win, others the engineers win. But we have to be prepared to fight for every car.”
Before any SZ revival, Alfa Romeo will begin its EV onslaught in 2024 with a compact SUV twinned with the Jeep Avenger, before electric replacements for the Giulia and Stelvio arrive in 2025 and 2026. A large E-segment car, thought to be a luxury saloon, is tipped to head to the US in 2027.
‘Il Mostro’, the SZ of 1989, could inspire form of prospective new Alfa. Next-gen Giulia could spawn a two-door, as did its ’60s forebear