The Midsummer is a Plus Six-based Pininfarina-Morgan collab priced from £120k
STEVE CROPLEY
M organ and Pininfarina have unveiled an exclusive barchetta-bodied, two-seat sports car called the Midsummer. Based on the underpinnings of Morgan’s existing Plus Six model, it is clad with a magnificent new hand-formed body on which both Pininfarina’s and Morgan’s design teams have cooperated.
The two partners say the car is a celebration of their combined 200 years of coachbuilding expertise. It is named after Midsummer Hill, which forms part of the Malvern Hills that tower above the Pickersleigh Road factory, where Morgan has been hand-building its cars since 1914. The Midsummer’s production will be limited to 50 units, which have already been sold to well-heeled supporters and friends of the marque.
Tipped to cost between £120,000 and £150,000, depending on the exact specifications laid down by owners, the Midsummer is powered by the same BMW-supplied 335bhp straight six as the standard car and is expected to broadly match its performance credentials: 0-62mph in 4.2sec and a top speed of 166mph.
The batch of 50 cars will run through Morgan’s existing production process for its Plus models and finish in the early months of 2025. Although the batch is small, Morgan CEO Massimo Fumarola said it adds emphasis to the company’s wider desire to create a series of limited-run specials, an initiative it launched with the Morgan CX-T – the “overland adventure” model – nearly three years ago.
Pininfarina and Morgan are extremely keen to emphasise the role of traditional coachbuilding skills in the Midsummer: many owners have already visited the Malvern Link works to view the prototype, holding one-to-one consultations with designers – including chief design officer Jonathan Wells, who has led the two-year project – to decide their cars’ exact equipment, colour and trim specifications.
The car even carries a unique version of the revered body-side badge that reads ‘Pininfarina Fuoriserie’, which indicates that the design is unique, and ‘out of series’.
While the Midsummer’s relationship with existing Morgans is very clear, almost every detail on the surface has been rethought or redeveloped.
The most eye-grabbing change is the generous use of beautifully sculpted laminated teak mouldings that surround the cockpit and provide the car with a distinct interior character and a new exterior profil
