Bovensiepen Zagato Driven: A New Chapter Written in Carbon and Italian Steel
Some legacies are too deeply ingrained to simply fade away. In the quiet Bavarian town of Buchloe, the Bovensiepen family has spent decades crafting some of the finest modified BMWs ever to grace a public road, under the legendary Alpina name. Now, with that iconic name sold to the BMW Group, the family hasn't retreated into retirement — far from it. Instead, they've launched an entirely new venture, Bovensiepen Automobile, and their debut model is nothing short of breathtaking: the Bovensiepen Zagato, a hand-built, carbon-bodied 2+2 coupe that fuses German mechanical precision with the timeless artistry of one of Italy's most celebrated coachbuilders.
The result is one of the most intriguing and visually arresting luxury performance cars of the decade — and we've had the chance to drive it.
From Alpina to Bovensiepen Automobile: A Family Legacy Reinvented
To understand the Bovensiepen Zagato, you first need to appreciate the weight of history behind it. For sixty years, the Bovensiepen name was synonymous with Alpina, a marque that turned BMW's already accomplished chassis and engines into something altogether more refined and more focused. Those cars — long-legged grand tourers with surprising athleticism lurking beneath their restrained exteriors — earned a devoted global following and the rare distinction of being officially classified as a separate manufacturer in Germany.
When the rights to the Alpina name were transferred to BMW Group, it marked the end of one extraordinary era. But for the Bovensiepen family, it signalled the beginning of another. Bovensiepen Automobile is not simply a rebadging exercise or a transitional stopgap — it represents a genuine creative reinvention, one that pairs their deeply embedded expertise in high-performance BMW engineering with an entirely new design philosophy. And for that new visual identity, they turned to Zagato.
Zagato's Touch: Norihiko Harada Pens a Modern Masterpiece
The body of the Bovensiepen Zagato was designed by Norihiko Harada, working from Zagato's studio just outside Milan. Harada, one of the most respected names in coachbuilding design, has brought a distinctly Italian sensibility to a project that is mechanically very German indeed. The result is a stunning, low-slung silhouette constructed almost entirely from carbon fibre — a material that keeps weight in check while giving the bodywork an unmistakable visual drama.
Every surface has been considered with the kind of obsessive detail that Zagato's long history demands. The double-bubble roofline, a signature Zagato motif reaching back decades, makes a subtle but unmistakable appearance. The flanks are tautly sculpted, the nose purposeful without being aggressive, and the overall proportions achieve something genuinely rare in the world of coachbuilt specials: a sense of coherence and restraint, rather than excess for its own sake.
This is, unambiguously, a beautiful car — and in a market segment where outlandish styling can often substitute for genuine artistry, that matters enormously.
BMW M-Car Hardware at Its Core
Beneath that exquisite Italian skin lies a very different story — one told in the language of Bavarian engineering. The Bovensiepen Zagato is built on BMW M-car hardware, giving it a mechanical foundation that is proven, potent, and deeply capable. This combination of a bespoke, coachbuilt exterior with a well-developed and trusted mechanical platform is a sensible strategy, offering buyers both exclusivity and the reliability that comes with serious automotive engineering investment behind the drivetrain.
The press drive took place at the Salzburgring, a circuit with long historical ties to the Bovensiepen family — it was here that Alpina regularly introduced new models to the automotive press, a tradition that has apparently carried over intact into this new chapter. On track, the Zagato revealed itself to be a serious performance machine, not merely a show car that happens to move under its own power. The BMW underpinnings deliver genuine dynamic credibility: the steering is alert and communicative, the braking — assisted by Brembo hardware — is confidence-inspiring, and the power delivery is muscular and linear in the way that the best BMW M engines consistently manage.
Yet despite the circuit setting, this is fundamentally a road car, a grand tourer conceived for real-world use and long-distance pleasure. The 2+2 configuration hints at practicality, or at least a degree of it, and the overall character of the car on circuit suggested that its true calling is sweeping mountain passes and open motorways, rather than lap times.
Priced at £320,000: Who Is the Bovensiepen Zagato For?
At £320,000, the Bovensiepen Zagato occupies a very specific and deliberately rarefied space in the market. It is positioned simultaneously as a collector's piece — a limited-production, coachbuilt rarity with genuine Zagato provenance — and as a credible performance car that its owner can actually drive with enthusiasm and confidence.
This dual positioning is clever. The collector car market has grown significantly in recent years, driven by buyers who want something genuinely exclusive but are unwilling to sacrifice dynamic capability for the sake of rarity alone. The Bovensiepen Zagato speaks directly to that audience: people who know their automotive history, who appreciate the significance of both the Bovensiepen name and the Zagato badge, and who want a car that rewards engagement as much as it rewards admiration from a distance.
A New Dawn for a Great Old Name
The Bovensiepen Zagato is, in almost every meaningful sense, a remarkable debut. It demonstrates that the family's departure from Alpina was not a retreat but a recalibration — a deliberate step toward something more personal, more artisanal, and perhaps even more ambitious than anything they produced under the old name.
The partnership with Zagato gives Bovensiepen Automobile an immediate design pedigree and a connection to one of motoring's most storied coachbuilding traditions. The reliance on BMW M-car hardware provides mechanical credibility and engineering depth. And the choice to launch at the Salzburgring, in the manner of those old Alpina press events, suggests that while the name on the car has changed, the spirit driving the people who build it very much has not.
In Buchloe, old habits die hard — and in the case of the Bovensiepen Zagato, that is an extraordinarily good thing.
Key Facts: Bovensiepen Zagato at a Glance
- Price: £320,000
- Body style: Carbon-bodied 2+2 coupe
- Design: Norihiko Harada for Zagato, Milan
- Mechanical platform: BMW M-car hardware
- Braking: Brembo brakes
- Manufacturer: Bovensiepen Automobile, Buchloe, Germany
- Character: Coachbuilt collector's car and road-going grand tourer