Never-Before-Seen Sketches Show How Cool Volkswagen Wanted To Be

A Familiar Alien

If you’re a hardcore Volkswagen fan, you’re probably aware of and interested in cars that the German automaker sold outside your home country. For such individuals, the shape in these never-before-published sketches shared to LinkedIn looks incredibly familiar, calling to mind Brazil’s Volkswagen SP2, an air-cooled coupe produced from 1972 to 1975 on the widened bones of a Karmann Ghia VW Type 14 with a Type 3 ‘pancake’ (boxer/horizontally opposed/flat) engine. Indeed, the SP2 inspired Volkswagen designer Tibor Juhasz back in 2017, when Volkswagen was evaluating various ways of offering EVs to the public.

Why The Concept Was Considered

“Back in 2017, my SP2 proposal was born from pure intuition. It envisioned an electric future powered by progress, yet deeply rooted in classic values,” explained Juhasz on LinkedIn. “My goal was clear: build forward without losing what defines us. Emotion, energy, and vision came together to create something that still resonates today.” According to his colleague, Stepan Rehak, who shared the sketches first spotted by Top Gear, the “sporty concept proposal” would have been built on the MEB platform, so it might have been relatively cost-effective to build. But the whole reason Volkswagen was working so fervently on all-electric vehicles at this time was to try to salvage its reputation following the immensely expensive Dieselgate scandal; the last thing VW needed was a sporty EV that would almost certainly sell in low volumes, even if it were offered globally, so it’s no wonder management passed on the retro coupe.

Just Get The Original

A little over 10,000 of the original SP2 were made, so they’re rare. But not necessarily expensive. According to Classic.com, the average value over the last five years has hovered around $24,000. Very few examples are on sale in America, but a resprayed 1975 model with around 41,000 miles is selling for $21,000 on Bring a Trailer, with four other examples on Hemmings.com, each different model years and different colors, ranging in price from $39,990 to $53,500. As an air-cooled Volkswagen from the 1970s, it’ll need babying and lots of rust prevention, but I guarantee you’ll draw more attention than the average Lambo.

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