Lotus Esprit
The Lotus Esprit was a
sports car built by
Lotus from 1976 to 2004. The Silver
Italdesign concept that eventually became the Esprit
was unveiled at the
Turin motor show in 1972, and was a development of a
stretched
Lotus Europa chassis. It is held to be among the
first of designer
Giorgetto Giugiaro's "folded paper" designs.
Originally, the name
Kiwi was proposed, but in keeping with the E naming
format of Lotus tradition, the name was changed to
Esprit. Historically it was able to match or better most
of its contemporary rivals' performance in many areas,
which included the
Ferrari 308, 328, F355, and 360 Modena, as well as
many
Porsche sports cars in a production life that lasted
nearly 30 years.
