Tag Archives: Automotive

Bugatti Residences Miami Is the Most Ambitious Branded Tower to Ever Hit the Miami River

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Bugatti has never done anything quietly — and its first American residential project is no exception. On the Miami River, Brandon Haw Architecture is designing a 60-story tower that carries the weight of one of the most storied names in automotive history, and the pressure to deliver is very much part of the brief.

Bugatti Residences Miami is the French marque’s first foray into the American residential market, following the announcement of its Dubai skyscraper in 2023. The site sits at 75 SW Miami Avenue Road in Brickell, commanding over 300 feet of Miami River frontage with sight lines toward Biscayne Bay. Developed by Prosper Group and Belgium’s Versluys Group, the $650 million tower will house 183 residences and four signature penthouses — a deliberately limited collection that keeps the exclusivity intact.

Designer: Brandon Haw Architecture

What Brandon Haw Architecture has pulled off visually is genuinely interesting. The tower is split into four distinct blocks with double-height spaces punctuating the vertical stack — a move that breaks the monotony of the typical glass curtain-wall high-rise and gives the building a sculptural, segmented rhythm that reads as kinetic from the street. The formal language draws from Bugatti’s C-line motif, a design element that has appeared on the brand’s cars since the 1930s, reinterpreted here in the building’s profile and detailing rather than applied as decorative branding.

Inside, Yabu Pushelberg handles the interiors — a pairing that makes immediate sense. The Toronto and New York-based studio brings a sensibility that is simultaneously refined and spatially generous, qualities that align with what Bugatti’s residential arm is chasing. According to Bugatti International managing director Wiebke Ståhl, the vision extends well beyond aesthetics: “every aspect, from exquisite design to seamless service and operations” is considered part of the experience. Rhodium has been named the residential operating partner, reinforcing that the project is being built as much around lifestyle delivery as an architectural statement.

What makes this project worth watching isn’t the brand name — it’s the combination of players. Brandon Haw Architecture has shown a consistent ability to work at the intersection of high design and urban context, and Miami’s river corridor is one of the few remaining sites in the city with genuine spatial drama. The Brickell location gives residents immediate access to one of Miami’s most active neighborhoods, but the river sets a different tempo — quieter, more considered, more architectural.

The residential offering is expected to launch in 2027. Between now and then, the anticipation alone will do exactly what Bugatti has always understood: make people wait for something worth waiting for.

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YouTuber builds 8-wheel electric wooden camper that spins 360-degrees and rides like a tank

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Have you been wanting to live out of an all-wooden camper? Driving solo to the pastures you visited with your father as a child but never had the opportunity to spend a night under the stars there, then brace up. You can follow the new 90-odd-minute detailed video from ambitious YouTuber Quiet Nerd, and build yourself an 8-wheel-drive electric tank-style steering wooden camper from scratch.

All you will need is tools and supplies. The brain is already applied. So even blindly following the instructions can confidently give you a near replica. That’s how elaborately detailed this entire DIY video is. When you’re ready with your cabin on eight wheels, you can, like the modder, steer it into the jungle for a fun-filled night in the wild. He had a night that belonged to him. A night with home-cooked sushi and some flat tires, and a subsequent morning with freshly-made pancakes and a broken front axle rod.

Designer: Quiet Nerd

Hopefully, your experience will be much better, coz you know when too many donuts in this guy are too many. The DIYer didn’t. Anyway! That’s for the fluff; let’s now get the real creation. “This is the most ambitious, complicated, and technically challenging build I have ever attempted,” the creator reveals at the beginning of the video. If you think that’s just said for the sake of it, you can spend some time reading about his previous DIY electric camper created around a wooden bed with tank treads for wheels.

Yes, Quiet Nerd is a genius when it comes to building these electric camping rigs from scratch. He has done it in the past, this time though, this fully electric, 8-wheel-drive micro camper that steers exactly like a tank is way different and above board than what he has created. In fact, I wouldn’t be kidding if I said this camper is definitely one of the most interesting DIY projects in the recent past. If not the camper itself, the video definitely deserves appreciation for its depth.

The build starts with a frame made of square punch tubing, which rests on eight separate 48-volt, 1000-watt brushless differential motors. To ensure a tank-steering mechanism for the cabin, the modder welded the differential gears in all eight gearboxes separately so they didn’t move. This meant the drivetrain on the left and right of the cabin could then work independently, which, when throttled in opposite directions, would allow the camper to perform perfect 360-degree donuts at one place.

Once the frame and the drivetrain were ready, suspensions were added to each of the eight wheels, and the modder then constructed the frame of the camper’s cabin using marine-grade wood. Interlocking pine wood panels were specially created for the siding, and the door was placed at the back. The floor was laid out with interlocking gym foam puzzle mats for comfort, and for ventilation, porthole windows are mounted on each side. On the front, vinyl sheets are used for the windscreen.

The batteries onboard are hooked up to a pair of 200-watt flexible solar panels mounted on the roof, which power the camper when its running or when stationary at the camp. When everything was checked and created, Quiet Nerd took the camper for a ride in the green pastures. Besides a few flat tires and a broken axle rod, most of the time in the woods was awesome, the modder notes in the video. Nighttime donuts are my favorite, but I still believe maybe he can get welded some cutters in the square punch tubing frame and this guy can be an awesome lawn mower. Or get a few ploughs in there and while doing donuts, it can help with ploughing the area.

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MSCHF warps two Lexus cars into surreal sculptures that look like a video glitch

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MSCHF is known for creating things out of the ordinary that defy logic. The Hot Wheels collaboration and Mercedes-AMG furniture collection are prime examples. Now the Brooklyn-based art collective is at it again with an illusory Lexus collaboration that turns their latest production cars into something that looks like a video glitch.

The project dubbed MOTOMORPHOSIS is a part of New York’s Armory Week art show, and Lexus’ boilerplate text in the press release is as mind-bending as the creation. As they say it, the vehicles showcased are special modifications with non-Lexus parts that may void warranty, negatively impact safety, and not be street legal.”

Designer: MSCHF and Lexus

The two works start with a Lexus RZ 450e and an RX 450h+, but little remains conventional about their final forms. The RZ becomes Circle Car, with its entire body bent into a continuous loop so that the nose meets the rear. The result looks as though a car has been caught driving in a circle and had its motion permanently baked into its shape. The RX, meanwhile, becomes Twisted Car, with its body pulled into a dramatic longitudinal spiral that stretches its windows, panels, and familiar design details along the twist.

MSCHF refers to these creations as “Form Cars,” deliberately positioning them against the familiar concept car. Rather than imagining a future vehicle with new technology or a different way of moving, the collective treats the automobile itself as a material to manipulate. The inspiration comes partly from digital 3D modeling, where operations such as bending, stretching, and twisting can turn a recognizable object into an impossible one. It also draws from animation’s “smear frames,” where forms are temporarily distorted to communicate speed and movement. Here, that fleeting distortion becomes physical.

Creating something that looks digitally warped still required very real fabrication. MSCHF began with steel armatures before assembling thousands of individual pieces to create the outer skin. The finishing, paint and protective coating follow processes familiar to automotive body shops, despite the radically unconventional shapes. Some components of the sculptures are genuine Lexus parts, but MSCHF is clear that neither piece is a functioning vehicle.

That distinction is important because MOTOMORPHOSIS is all about redesigning the car’s form in a twisted universe. The unmodified RZ 450e and RX 450h+ are displayed alongside their distorted counterparts, making the transformation easier to understand. Familiar proportions, lights, glass, and body surfaces remain recognizable even after being pushed into physically impossible arrangements.

MOTOMORPHOSIS opens at Chelsea Industrial in New York from September 24 to 26, with public hours on September 25 and 26. Admission is free with an RSVP, giving visitors a chance to see what happens when the rigid geometry of a production automobile is treated more like digital clay than transportation.

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Middle East’s Exobot electric cars arrive with supercar DNA and futuristic looks

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In the universe of the Tesla Cybertruck, Model S, Lucid Air, and Rivian R1T, a new flagship electric SUV and sedan have landed from the Middle East. Back in 2022, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) formed the country’s first-ever EV brand, CEER. Now they’ve launched their maiden SUV and sedan, homegrown and manufactured in the Middle East, to take on the stalwarts of the industry.

They call it the Exobot series, which comprises the electric SUV and sedan – first in line of the 5 other vehicles slated to launch over a length of the next five years. These EVs will be spread across various propulsion options and produced in the CEER Manufacturing Complex (CMC), claimed by the maker to be one of the largest and most advanced automotive production facilities in the region.

Designer: CEER

CEER is confident that the upcoming fleet of electric vehicles is going to be of the highest global standards, further strengthening Saudi Arabia’s position as a rising force in the global automotive industry. For now, the brand has revealed the Sci-Fi-inspired siblings designed by McLaren’s former design director Rob Melville. Both these vehicles have a similar DNA; they just differ in category and in their distinct body styles. The design language remains the same, as the front section is very low-slung and gets taller at the rear, just like the cars of the 1970s.

Both the future-forward EVs have around 2.5 meters of windshield at 15 degrees, windswept for an open-air feel, a very distinct concept-car-like shape, and manly light bars fitted with 32 varying lighting elements at the front and back. In fact, the open-air windshield is the first ever on a production car. Those Falcon-inspired Shahin doors are gull-winged to spread 10 feet, and don’t have any B-pillar for any visual hindrance.

The luxury sedan is longer than the Tesla Model S at 5,260mm and 1,428 mm tall, which makes it shorter than the Mercedes-Benz EQS, or even some of the popular options. CEER says the EV has a range of 416 miles, and it will vary depending on the model chosen. The standard edition churns out 850 horsepower to make it go from 0-62 mph in 2.6 seconds, while the Top trim produces 1,111 horsepower and 1,500 Nm, which are both better than Tesla. With these numbers, the sedan can go from standstill to over 60 mph in mere 2.1 seconds. The top speed of 155 mph, which is electronically limited, is also impressive.  The 800-volt platform it shares with the SUV makes it go from 10 percent charge level to 80 percent with just 30 minutes of plugging in.

The crossover SUV measures 5,016 mm long, 2,101 mm wide, and 1,693 mm tall, with a 3,200 mm wheelbase. It has a claimed NEDC range of 348 miles on a single charge, and about the same power delivery figures as the classy sedan. Both vehicles get a yoke-shaped steering wheel complemented by the huge 8K screen that runs the length of the windshield. There is a vertical 10.4-inch touchscreen in front of the center console. Rear passengers can enjoy multimedia content on the 8-inch display on the rear seats. The SUV gets the steer-by-wire tech and rear wheel steering for parallel parking, which puts it in a category of its own.

CEER plans to begin sales in early 2027, with deliveries expected in March. Initially, the Exobot sedan and the SUV are going to be sold in the Gulf markets in limited First Edition models. The customizable Plus trims will arrive some time later. The pricing has not yet been revealed, so it’ll be interesting to see how these modern EVs stack up against the competition.

 

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Someone Designed India’s Humble Tuk-Tuk As A Modern-day Renault-style Mini EV

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The Tuk-tuk, also called the ‘Auto Rickshaw’ in South Asia, actually comes from Italy! The original three-wheeled vehicle was manufactured by Piaggio and popularized in the continent under the model name Apé before other brands caught on. The vehicular category is now an unshakeable part of Indian automotive culture. In its regular form, the Auto Rickshaw (as opposed to the hand-pulled carts called Rickshaws) is a mode of public transport, seating up to three people at the back. Swap the back seat out for a truck bed and the Auto Rickshaw becomes a transport vehicle for all sorts of cargo, from furniture to fresh produce. The only problem with the Auto Rickshaw is that it hasn’t fundamentally changed in its aesthetic in decades. Carbon Noir proposes an alternative.

Dubbed the ‘Cyberpunk 2077 Auto Rickshaw’, this concept vehicle has a few changes on and under the hood. For starters, it comes with an electric powertrain, making it way more energy efficient than the fuel and CNG guzzling autos you see on Indian roads. Secondly, the exterior gets an absolute makeover, which I have mixed feelings on.

Designer: Carbon Noir

There’s a lot to appreciate about the makeover – you’ve got modernized headlights and taillights, an actual hardbody design that isn’t a metal armature roof with fabric pulled over it, and an aesthetic that feels very Renault Twizy but dialed back. The only real problem (and this is entirely in my head) is the dual-tone design, which gives the E-tuk (electric tuk-tuk) the stature and vibe of the Fisher Price toy car, but with a green base. That’s quite literally the only gripe I have. Ditch the two-tone and you have a winner on your hands.

The E-tuk sports a few interesting design details. It contains a usable boot, which most auto rickshaws don’t have. The conventional auto rickshaw packs the engine in the back, but one can assume that an electrified platform frees the boot up, letting people store luggage inside. Speaking of inside, the interiors see a pretty remarkable change too. The original auto rickshaw seats one in the cockpit, and 2-3 at the back. This revised model opts for a traditional 2×2 seating structure, while retaining the handlebar controls instead of swapping it for a steering wheel. Spiritually, this still feels like an auto rickshaw.

Like most auto rickshaws in India, the E-tuk sports doors on the left side of the vehicle, leaving the right bare. A mere bar on the right side blocks passengers in the back from falling off (or jumping out of a moving ride), but the front still lets the driver enter and exit freely. For riders, entry and exit happens purely through the left, using the doors on both the front as well as the back.

Like I said, spiritually, this is still the quintessential Auto Rickshaw. That two-tone design is iconic, although it serves no purpose here since the green-bottom Auto Rickshaws are painted to denote that they run on Compressed Natural Gas and not petrol. The handlebars for the auto-rider are iconic too, and an open-side design means accepting the weather the city gives you – sun on hot days, wind on good days, and dust or rain on bad days. That’s the non-verbal contract you sign when you sit in an ‘auto’. Yeah, and sure the thing is powered by an electric drivetrain, but that doesn’t mean we’re getting in-vehicle air-conditioning anytime soon!

The post Someone Designed India’s Humble Tuk-Tuk As A Modern-day Renault-style Mini EV first appeared on Yanko Design.

Someone Designed India’s Humble Tuk-Tuk As A Modern-day Renault-style Mini EV

Posted on by

The Tuk-tuk, also called the ‘Auto Rickshaw’ in South Asia, actually comes from Italy! The original three-wheeled vehicle was manufactured by Piaggio and popularized in the continent under the model name Apé before other brands caught on. The vehicular category is now an unshakeable part of Indian automotive culture. In its regular form, the Auto Rickshaw (as opposed to the hand-pulled carts called Rickshaws) is a mode of public transport, seating up to three people at the back. Swap the back seat out for a truck bed and the Auto Rickshaw becomes a transport vehicle for all sorts of cargo, from furniture to fresh produce. The only problem with the Auto Rickshaw is that it hasn’t fundamentally changed in its aesthetic in decades. Carbon Noir proposes an alternative.

Dubbed the ‘Cyberpunk 2077 Auto Rickshaw’, this concept vehicle has a few changes on and under the hood. For starters, it comes with an electric powertrain, making it way more energy efficient than the fuel and CNG guzzling autos you see on Indian roads. Secondly, the exterior gets an absolute makeover, which I have mixed feelings on.

Designer: Carbon Noir

There’s a lot to appreciate about the makeover – you’ve got modernized headlights and taillights, an actual hardbody design that isn’t a metal armature roof with fabric pulled over it, and an aesthetic that feels very Renault Twizy but dialed back. The only real problem (and this is entirely in my head) is the dual-tone design, which gives the E-tuk (electric tuk-tuk) the stature and vibe of the Fisher Price toy car, but with a green base. That’s quite literally the only gripe I have. Ditch the two-tone and you have a winner on your hands.

The E-tuk sports a few interesting design details. It contains a usable boot, which most auto rickshaws don’t have. The conventional auto rickshaw packs the engine in the back, but one can assume that an electrified platform frees the boot up, letting people store luggage inside. Speaking of inside, the interiors see a pretty remarkable change too. The original auto rickshaw seats one in the cockpit, and 2-3 at the back. This revised model opts for a traditional 2×2 seating structure, while retaining the handlebar controls instead of swapping it for a steering wheel. Spiritually, this still feels like an auto rickshaw.

Like most auto rickshaws in India, the E-tuk sports doors on the left side of the vehicle, leaving the right bare. A mere bar on the right side blocks passengers in the back from falling off (or jumping out of a moving ride), but the front still lets the driver enter and exit freely. For riders, entry and exit happens purely through the left, using the doors on both the front as well as the back.

Like I said, spiritually, this is still the quintessential Auto Rickshaw. That two-tone design is iconic, although it serves no purpose here since the green-bottom Auto Rickshaws are painted to denote that they run on Compressed Natural Gas and not petrol. The handlebars for the auto-rider are iconic too, and an open-side design means accepting the weather the city gives you – sun on hot days, wind on good days, and dust or rain on bad days. That’s the non-verbal contract you sign when you sit in an ‘auto’. Yeah, and sure the thing is powered by an electric drivetrain, but that doesn’t mean we’re getting in-vehicle air-conditioning anytime soon!

The post Someone Designed India’s Humble Tuk-Tuk As A Modern-day Renault-style Mini EV first appeared on Yanko Design.

This 672-pound camper lets you escape without needing a heavy-duty tow vehicle

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Something is appealing about a camper trailer that isn’t desperate to become your second home on wheels. Aliner seems to be leaning into that idea with the return of the Alite, a tiny A-frame trailer that disappeared from the company’s lineup nearly a decade ago. Now back for 2027, it weighs just 672 pounds dry and measures 11 feet long, making it the smallest and lightest hard-sided camper Aliner currently builds.

The Alite originally arrived in the late 1990s and stayed in production until 2017. Its return wasn’t prompted by a new camping trend or a redesign strategy. According to Aliner, customers and dealers kept asking for it after production ended, eventually giving the company enough reason to bring the little trailer back.

Designer: Aliner

The flat-pack towable camper proportions are what make the whole idea interesting. Folded down, the A-frame has a relatively easy-to-manage footprint for storage and towing. Once opened at a campsite, the roof rises into a full-height interior with an 80-inch peak, and Aliner claims the setup takes about 30 seconds. That is a useful distinction for a trailer intended for quick weekend trips. Inside, there isn’t much wasted space because there isn’t much available to waste. Two benches sit along the sides, with the 62-by-24-inch roadside bench and 41-by-14-inch curbside bench converting into a 58-by-76-inch bed. There is also 2.7 cubic feet of exterior storage at the front, plus another 24-by-15-inch storage compartment accessible through a baggage door.

That layout says quite a bit about who the Alite is for. There is no attempt to squeeze in a bathroom, full kitchen, or the increasingly elaborate collection of amenities found in larger travel trailers. It gives you somewhere to sleep, somewhere to sit, a solid roof, storage for the basics, and protection from the weather. The rest of the campsite remains outside. The low weight also changes the equation between the camper and the vehicle pulling it. The Alite has a 1,100-pound GVWR, and Aliner says it can be towed by essentially all vehicles. That doesn’t mean every car can safely tow a loaded trailer, of course; the vehicle’s rated towing capacity still matters, as does everything added to those 672 pounds once the camping gear goes in.

The trailer rides on 14-inch aluminum wheels and uses 30-amp electrical service, with a 25-foot power cord included. A lockable entry door adds a little security without complicating the basic setup. The 2027 Alite made its consumer debut at America’s Largest RV Show in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and is expected to reach Aliner’s nationwide dealer network this winter. The Alite Base has a price of $17,650. At a time when compact trailers increasingly resemble miniature apartments, the Alite goes in the other direction. It is a bed and shelter on wheels, designed to get you to the campsite without demanding a large vehicle, or a large storage space. For some campers, that may be exactly the point!

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This Hydrogen Motorcycle Concept Revives a 90-Year-Old BMW Idea That Never Reached Production

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In 1934, a BMW designer named Alfred Böning built a motorcycle so far ahead of its time that BMW itself did not know what to do with it. The R7 wrapped its entire mechanical guts in smooth, pressed steel bodywork shaped by Art Deco geometry, and it was so expensive and so strange next to the “bicycle with a motor” norms of the era that BMW shelved the one and only unit, crated it up, and basically forgot it existed. It sat lost in a warehouse until someone rediscovered it in 2005. It took until 2012, and a full restoration by Hans Keckeisen, for the world to actually see what Böning had been sitting on for seven decades, and it walked away with best in class at Pebble Beach the moment it did.

I bring this up because REV-1 feels like the same idea getting a second shot, minus the eight decades of waiting around in a crate. Designer Lennart Baramsky has wrapped a hydrogen powertrain in one continuous, hand-formed aluminum shell with barely a shut line in sight, badged simply REV-1 on the flank. There is no traditional fork, no fairing bolted over a chassis, just one sculpted metal body with cutouts carved through it like a machine that grew its own windows. Böning would probably recognize the impulse immediately, even if the engineering underneath has changed a lot in ninety years.

Designer: Lennart Baramsky

The front end is the part that stops you. Instead of a telescopic fork, there is a linkage setup, rod ends, a rocker arm, and a coilover mounted almost flat against the body, the same basic family of idea behind hub-center designs like the Bimota Tesi or the BMW Duolever we have covered on this site before, except here it disappears into the bodywork so completely you have to squint to find where the suspension actually lives. That single design decision does more to sell the “grown, not built” read of this bike than anything else on it.

The badge on the tank claims a 450kW hydrogen core, and I want to be honest about what that number means in context. The most advanced real hydrogen motorcycle running today, Kawasaki’s Ninja H2 HySE, went public at Suzuka in 2024 making nowhere near that figure, and hydrogen fuel cell scooters like Suzuki’s Burgman have spent over a decade proving out the tech at a fraction of REV-1’s claimed output. That is not a knock on the design. It is a reminder that this is a concept badge doing concept badge things, the same way we flagged when covering Bandit9’s aluminum and carbon fiber Ducati builds that a beautiful shell does not always mean a buildable one.

What REV-1 actually nails is the argument that a motorcycle can be one object instead of a pile of bolted-together ones. Böning tried to make that case in 1934 and got a crate for his trouble. Baramsky is making it again in an era with hydrogen fuel cells and render engines good enough to sell the illusion completely, and whether or not this thing ever turns a wheel in real life, the shape has already done its job.

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Ebicos Happy Dreamer collapsible pod turns your van into a camper without modifications

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It’s not necessary to go about converting the entire innards of a van to achieve camping convenience. You can just clean out the cabin to make space for an electric camper pod, and it will do the rest. Instantly transforming your ride into a fully-fledged camping rig, you can pull out from the back at a campsite and live freely.

The concept of camper pods got a new dimension and meaning at the recently concluded Düsseldorf Caravan Salon. First, we were floored by the versatility and convenience of the Cubivan Camping System, and now our minds are blown away by the simplicity and portable design of the new Ebicos Happy Dreamer. The latter is not as elaborate (with a pop-up roof et al) like the Cubivan’s system, yet is a small and useful addition to tailgate camping in a van.

Designer: Ebicos

As its marketing jingle on the website reads, the Happy Deamer is a tiny, collapsible camper pod that “transforms your everyday vehicle into an adventure vehicle in minutes. No tools required. No modifications needed,” the company notes. Each of these modules, which deploys and retracts with a single push of a button, is manufactured in the company’s workshop in Saxony, Germany, and comes with the features of a full conversion, “but without the full conversion.”

When not onboard your van, the Happy Dreamer – made using polypropylene honeycomb panels and aluminum honeycomb flooring – can collapse down to measure 47- x 51- x 11 inches, so a couple of people can easily carry it off (for storage) and onto the van back for camping. It weighs almost 60 kg and could be purchased with a wheeled trolley, making it just ideal for a solo van camper.

When you want to install the camper pod, you can install it using the three walls and roof secured through rails and latches. The cube shaped pod, then can slide on the rails in and out of the van tailgate. When pulled out at camp, the pod rests stably on its drop-down legs (hitting the ground) and provides campers with king-size bed space to sleep from inside the van out to the pod. For further security and living convenience, the tailgate can be secured to the Happy Dreamer’s roof by a cord, while the space between the pod and the van interior is filled with fabric insulation to seal out weather and insects.

The Happy Dreamer is designed to be a versatile pod, ensuring compatibility with a range of midsize and small cargo and passenger vans. Even though the pod itself comes raw and only provides a place to sleep. The company says it will offer add-ons for a functional slide-out kitchen. The pod will start at €6,250 (approximately $8,500).

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Porsche’s 550 J is a racing legend shrunk into an electric track-day car

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The Porsche 550 Spyder occupies a special place in the brand’s motorsport history. Developed specifically for racing, the lightweight mid-engined sports car proved that clever engineering and low weight could challenge competitors with considerably larger engines. At the 1954 Carrera Panamericana, factory drivers Hans Herrmann and Jaroslav Juhan took their 550 Spyders to third and fourth overall while winning their class, covering the demanding 3,077-kilometre race route.

For the 75th anniversary of Porsche Motorsport, Hedley Studios has reinterpreted that racing icon as the Porsche 550 J, an officially licensed electric replica built at approximately 80 percent of the original’s size. The “J” stands for Junior, but this is not a toy. It is a handcrafted two-seater intended for collectors and enthusiasts who want to experience the character of a historic Porsche in a much smaller package. Only 250 examples will be produced.

Designer: Hedley Studios and Porsche

The compact proportions measure around 2.9 metres long and 1.2 metres wide, yet the scaled-down body still accommodates two adults. Porsche provided Hedley Studios with access to its corporate archives and an original 550 during development, helping the British company capture the proportions and details of the original without simply producing a museum-style replica. The carbon-fibre body sits over a steel space-frame chassis, while the battery pack is positioned behind the seats to recreate the weight distribution and mid-engined character of the original.

Electric power gives the 550 J a distinctly modern interpretation of the classic formula. Its 48-volt drivetrain produces 8 kW in standard form, with an RS Package increasing output to 16 kW. The standard version can reach approximately 80 km/h, while the RS version raises the top speed to around 50 mph. The RS Package also adds drilled brakes and adjustable dampers, while four drive modes—Novice, Comfort, Sport and Race—bring a contemporary interface to the otherwise vintage-inspired cockpit.

The chassis is equally important to the experience. Hedley has adapted the original 550’s trailing-arm suspension for the smaller car, combining it with Bilstein coilover dampers, Eibach springs and Brembo brakes. Custom switchgear inspired by Porsche’s modern Taycan adds another subtle connection between the 1950s original and its electric successor.

Visually, the 550 J stays close to the elegant simplicity that made the original distinctive. Buyers can choose Porsche Silver alongside heritage-inspired blue, white, yellow and red finishes, while Hedley’s Bespoke programme opens up further paint, livery and detail combinations. Every example is handcrafted at Hedley Studios in Bicester, UK.

The Porsche 550 J is not road legal, so its natural home is a private estate, closed course or suitable track environment. Pricing starts at £69,500 (approximately $93,500), with deliveries expected from spring 2027.

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