Fiat Barchetta

From the humblest of origins, some truly amazing things can be born. The Barchetta is certainly one of them. Developed from its unpretentious MK1 Punto underpinnings, the effortlessly stylish sportscar ticks every box when it comes to soft-top motoring. Gorgeous? Check. Fun? In spades. Makes every trip feel a little bit special? Mm-hmm.

We’ve been dealing with these wonderful cars since our inception in the early 2000’s, when there will still a few nearly new examples raising eyebrows in bread-and-butter car auctions. Because of Fiat’s stubborn decision to keep the steering wheel on the left of that beautiful cabin, they may never have been a huge seller in the UK but they have rightfully built up an enthusiastic following. If you’ve never driven a Barchetta, you need to rectify this ASAP and learn what the rest of us have been banging on about for years.

FIat Barchetta MK1

The first version of the Barchetta is, for us, the purest implementation of the “little-boat” design. We do seem to have collected a very high percentage of silver examples, something we need to rectify immediately with a nice yellow or orange added to the colour chart. The LE we had with the red quilted leather interior was a definite highlight.

Fiat Barchetta MK2

Originally, Fiat had farmed out the building of the Barchetta to Maggiora in Chivasso. When they went bankrupt, however, Fiat weren’t quite ready to drop their soft-top from their rather bland early millenium range. So, production moved in-house and the Barchetta received some interesting aesthetic updates. Most noticeable, the “mohawk” style third brake light emerged from the bootlid and the delicate rounding of the silhouette was slightly more squared off. Nothing was done to spoil the delightful driving experience, however. This black example we sold in 2017 was featured in Classic Car Buyer and definitely turned heads with the red roof we fitted.