Ghia Karmann Ghia History

Work on what would become the Karmann Ghia began in 1953, when German coachbuilder Wilhelm Karmann commissioned Carrozzeria Ghia to style a coupé body over the Volkswagen Beetle's floorpan and air-cooled drivetrain. The design — low, rounded, and distinctly Italian — was presented at the Frankfurt Motor Show in August 1955 and became an immediate sensation. VW had never offered anything so elegant.

Because the bodies were hand-formed and welded at Karmann's Osnabrück plant before being shipped to Wolfsburg for final assembly, build quality was notably high — though performance was modest: the Beetle's 1.2-litre engine produced around 36 hp at launch. Buyers were paying for style, not speed. A convertible joined the coupé in 1957, cementing the car's appeal to lifestyle buyers across Europe and North America.

Production ran until the summer of 1974, by which point more than 445,000 Karmann Ghia Type 14 coupés and cabriolets had been built in Germany alone. Its replacement, the Golf-based Scirocco (also styled with Giugiaro's hand), arrived the same year. In Brazil, where the car was assembled locally, production continued into 1975.