Today’s Rare Ride hails from a brand your author hadn’t heard of until this tweet yesterday. My fingers could not fly fast enough to obtain more information on this beautiful spectacle of an off-road luxury grand touring SUV. Are your eyes ready?
Fornasari was founded in Italy sometime in 1999, and named after its founder Giuseppe Fornasari. Mr. F worked with investors and some of his friends to start up an all-new off-road luxury car firm. Fornasari had an interest in sporty motorcars since the early Nineties. He purchased a Corvette (the C4, very good) in the U.S. and wanted to take it racing. It’s unclear whether that occurred, but what is clear is that Fornasari did make several different models in the early 2010s, seven to be exact.
The largest of the brand’s portfolio was the 99 (sometimes called RR99). The only four-door car the company produced, it was considered to possess all the qualities of a grand touring car, a luxury sedan, and a real off-road machine, wrapped into one special and beautiful package.
Power arrived from the Corvette which Fornasari loved so much, in either 6.2- or 7.0-liter V8 guises. That meant power on offer ranged from 500 to 750 horses, depending on how fast a buyer wanted to escape good taste. For the more frugal a 3.0-liter turbodiesel was introduced sometime later, though it managed a more measly 250 horses. Transmissions on offer were of six-speed manual or six-speed automatic varieties. Standard drivetrain configuration was four-wheel drive, but rear-wheel drive was also available.
Widely configurable in its appearance, the 99 was a custom-order vehicle that was built to suit the desires of its customer. Paint and interior colors, “formula” ready brakes, and touring or off-road suspensions. Even the body material was configurable: Spendy customers chose carbon fiber, but aluminum was an option as well. Interiors were an amalgam of what look to be Cadillac DTS and STS components, alongside some other bits of unknown origin. Headlamps arrived via Aston Martin, tails from Lamborghini. Truly a global effort, though the below video shows some body roll not quite up to Aston or Lamborghini standards.
It’s unclear how many 99s were produced, or in fact how long the company was actually in business. Safe bet very few exist, and I couldn’t find any 99 sale listings present or past. The company’s website (still up and running) debuted in 2011 but was not updated past September 2012. Fornasari did participate in racing for a couple of years while it was building its sports luxury cars. Per Wiki, the company went bust by 2015.
[Images: Fornasari]
Wow that is a really neat vehicle and one I never heard of or seen before.
I do believe Mr. Fornasari built this off the platform of a last-gen Jaguar XF. Some bodywork was done on the rear doors, but the profile is pretty much unmistakable.
Side view:
https://cdcssl.ibsrv.net/autodata/images/?IMG=USB90JAC131A01302.JPG&width=1024
http://www.italiaspeed.com/2009/cars/others/fornasari/11/rr99/gallery/115.html
Check out the interior door panels as well.
Either way, Mr. Fornasari delivered quite the hideous-looking vehicle here. But I give him credit for solving the XF’s one major issue: the engine. A ‘Vette-powered XF would have been killer.
I Googled Fornasari images and also found the Gigi 311 GT. I find that one very interesting looking.
Looks like a lifted RX-8.
At first glance I thought it was the next gen Charger. Nice looking car
Use Google images and see the rear. You’ll change your tune on the Charger comparison.
I still see a lot of Charger/Crossfire in that rear end. Chrysler could do a lot worse with this design adapted to the Charger
It looks like a lifted Charger, with lots of stuff stuck on it.
Hmm. I don’t find it all that beautiful.
Looks like the CAD designer stretched it from the midplane downward.
Atrocious, quite the opposite of that Isdera. It’s like they’d never heard of proportion or composition.
The rear end took me by surprise in the video. I thought it was a 3 box sedan from the photos.
Somebody welded a Panamera front to a Mustang rear and gave if a lift.
Put a BMW or Mercedes grille on this and they’d be lining up to buy them.
Looks gangly and awkward. The roofline is rubbish. The dash is a little boy’s dream. The rear wheels are so far back it reminds me of the original Toyota Tercel. Beautiful? Well, each to their own. But I’d say the looks are why nobody ever heard of it before due to tiny sales. A rare ride indeed,
Boy y’all really need a /s tag huh. I thought the text of the article would cover it but that’s my bad.
All the views of the car remind me of a Dodge Charger in a very general way. Nice looking car and good article, Corey. Thanks for doing this one up!
Definite Charger feels there.
I really wanna read the POA&M (Plan of Action and Milestones) for how these bored rich guys go from “I think I want my own car company” to vehicles actually coming off a production line. Even if you are a luxury coachbuilder making a handful of cars, it’s quite an achievement.