Studebaker’s Italian Job: The 1960 Lark Frua

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When we think of Studebaker, we don’t often picture fine Italian coachbuilding, but here are three examples that break the mold.

 

Pietro Frua (1913-1983) may not be the most famous Italian car designer of his time, but he was an influential and prolific one. He served key roles in several important Italian design houses, while his many notable works include the Glas GT Coupe, Cabriolet, and 2600, the Maserati Mistral, and the AC Frua Spyder, to name just a few. However, our focus here is on three remarkable Studebaker Larks that carried bodies of his design.

 

In 1960, Renato Bornigia, entrepreneur and Studebaker concessionaire for Italy, arranged to have three Studebaker Lark chassis, complete with engines and running gear, shipped from the factory in South Bend, Indiana to Europe in care of Frua in Turin. Studebaker was still using traditional body-on-frame rather than unitized construction to manufacture the Lark, simplifying the project. (See our feature on the Lark here.)  The actual level of Studebaker corporate involvement in the exercise is unknown, to us anyway.

Two four-door sedans and one two-door coupe were constructed on these chassis in a collaboration between Frua and Italsuisse of Geneva, the coach shop founded by Adriano Guglielmetti, a former Frua employee. One sedan was powered by the trusty Champion 170 CID L-head six, the other by a 259 CID V8, while all three bodies were steel and differed significantly in detail. (At the same time, Bornigia also arranged to have a fourth rebodied Lark built by Carrozzeria Francis Lombardi of Vercelli, a dramatic fastback coupe, but that’s another story for another day.)

The custom-bodied Studebakers were displayed at the Turin and Geneva auto shows in 1960 and 1961, as Bornigia was working on an ambitious plan that included a production run of 1000 vehicles. But the venture never went anywhere and the cars dropped from sight. Decades later, the two sedans eventually made their way to the United States, although they are in tough shape at last report, while the coupe is lost and presumed destroyed.

 

4 thoughts on “Studebaker’s Italian Job: The 1960 Lark Frua”

  1. Interesting to be sure, the Stude familial resemblance is there, but also … at the risk of offending some … a vague similarity to the Maserati Quattroporte of the same era.

  2. Very interesting. I didn’t see any Lark resemblance at all, but after looking for a while, the theme emerges. This would have made a fine next-generation Lark.

  3. There really is not ANY Lark Look, Resemblance or exterior Parts at all on these 4 Doors, as I have seen them up close, it’s all Italian no US influnce at all except a few Interior Parts and the complete Chassis and Power Trains.

    Rich.

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