Some years do not simply pass. They remain suspended in the cultural fabric of a territory, waiting for the right objects and spaces to complete their statement.
In Piedmont, 1969 was exactly such a year.
At the Turin Motor Show that autumn, Nuccio Bertone presented the Autobianchi A112 Runabout concept: a radical open barchetta shaped by Marcello Gandini through just two decisive lines, a sharp horizontal beltline and an L-shaped upper contour. Inspired by the functional elegance of Italian motorboats, it rejected ornament in favor of pure geometry, lightness, and sculptural presence. It was never produced at the time, yet its wedge silhouette and nautical spirit quietly influenced an entire generation of Italian sports cars.
More than fifty years later,the all-new Runabout is the first model in to enter the Bertone Classic range. Strictly limited to 25 examples worldwide, it translates the essential design language of the 1969 concept into a modern masterpiece while preserving its core character: open-air freedom, essential proportions, and the authorship of Italian coachbuilding.
More than fifty years later,the all-new Runabout is the first model in to enter the Bertone Classic range. Strictly limited to 25 examples worldwide, it translates the essential design language of the 1969 concept into a modern masterpiece while preserving its core character: open-air freedom, essential proportions, and the authorship of Italian coachbuilding.
To present this continuation of a design legacy, we chose a location that belongs to the same cultural moment: Villa Gontero in Cumiana, just outside Turin.
Designed between 1969 and 1971 by architect Carlo Graffi with structural engineering by Sergio Musmeci, Villa Gontero stands as one of Piedmont’s most compelling expressions of experimental brutalism. Commissioned by entrepreneur Riccardo Gontero, the residence is a living brutalist manifesto. Its stepped, cantilevered slabs of exposed concrete, suspended living volume, and brutalist material honesty declare structure as the primary aesthetic gesture.
Here, concrete is not heavy or cold. It is disciplined, precise, and almost lyrical. The villa does not hide how it is made; it celebrates it.
A great ensemble of how function becomes identity.
The dialogue with the Bertone Runabout is immediate and profound. Both objects emerged from the same late-1960s Piedmontese environment, a fertile territory where automotive design, architecture, and industrial vision evolved side by side. Turin’s legacy of engineering precision and artistic rebellion links Gandini’s work at Bertone with the experimental structures of Graffi and Musmeci.
In both the car and the house, complexity is reduced to strong, memorable gestures. The Runabout’s taut beltline answers the villa’s horizontal concrete strata. Its low, floating stance echoes the cantilevered ends of the residence. Even the subtle red accents in the villa’s detailing find a quiet resonance with the car’s graphic elements in our imagery.
Structure is not concealed behind style. Structure is style.
The new Runabout remains faithful to the spirit of its 1969 predecessor while delivering contemporary performance and driving emotion. It is offered in two body styles: the pure open Barchetta and the more versatile Targa with a removable roof panel. At its heart lies a mid-mounted 3.5-litre supercharged V6 producing 475 hp and 490 Nm of torque, paired with a six-speed manual gearbox and rear-wheel drive.
The Runabout keeps curb weight remarkably low, delivering a power-to-weight ratio that translates into visceral, analog driving pleasure. Updated performance figures now place 0–100 km/h at approximately 3.1 seconds, with a top speed of 270 km/h.
At Villa Gontero, the Runabout expresses an ode to Made in Italy, to design at its highest artistic and stylistic peak, to brutalism, and to a deeper cultural alignment. The villa frames the car in its proper context: as a machine conceived for engaging analog driving, as a design-driven high-performance collectible, and as a continuation of an Italian way of thinking about form.
In the hills of Piedmont, against those raw concrete planes, the Runabout appears as unfinished business from 1969 finally finding its natural home.
Horizontal concrete meets horizontal beltline.
Suspended mass meets planted, dynamic stance.
Each sharpens the other: the architecture lends historical gravity and material discipline; the car injects speed, tension, and contemporary myth.
This is what “Made in Italy” truly means at Bertone: not a label, but a method. A deep confidence in proportion, craft, emotion, and experimentation coexisting in a single object. The Runabout speaks that language through coachbuilding, sculptural purity, and an authored driving experience. Villa Gontero speaks it through concrete, structural audacity, and domestic vision.
In the end, Runabout x Villa Gontero is more than a setting. It is a statement of continuity.
1969 was never just a date. It was a design position: radical yet disciplined, futuristic yet sensual.
In the landscape of Piedmont, that position still drives.
