‘I was enthralled by the lavish feel, tarnished only by an anti-corrosion warranty sticker added as an afterthought’
For years, one of my most prized brochures was the glossy job created to launch the Lancia Gamma in the UK in 1978. My local dealer, Knibbs, gave them out to anyone who looked half interested in 1980, mindful no doubt that the carburetted S1 was about to be usurped by the injected S2. I was enthralled not only by the cars, but also the lavish feel of this landscape brochure, tarnished only by a ʻSix Year Anti-Corrosion Warrantyʼ sticker added as an afterthought, this being the height of the Beta rust debacle.
Thanks to Patrick Ridley-Martin, I have the inside story of this 25-page epic. Now retired, and enjoying a CVT Panda that must be rarer than any Gamma, Patrick moved from Fiat to Lancia in the early ʼ70s and stayed with the group until the launch of the Maserati Ghibli. “When I joined, Lancia was still at Alperton and had just gone over to the 2000HF with ʻDaytonaʼ dials, where the rev counter and speedometer needles swept around in unison,” he recalls.
When the time came to bring the Gamma to the UK, the team realised it couldnʼt use the bizarre Italian fold-out publication devised for this flagship, so got the budget to take a pair of right-hand-drive cars to Italy. One image shows the bronze Coupé and silver Berlina outside a lavish villa, with Patrick as an extra leaning on the balcony. Another portrays a lady collecting high heels from Turinʼs most exclusive bootmaker. “While we were doing that one,” says Patrick, “an Italian policeman appeared and said, ʻYou canʼt take photos here; if you are still here in half an hour, Iʼll arrest you.ʼ Yet he failed to notice the Berlina had a fake Roma plate on the back and a British one on the front.”
To emphasise the saloonʼs ʻexecutiveʼ appeal, a scene was set up at Caselle airport with Gianni Agnelliʼs Learjet: “Just before that photo was shot, Agnelli turned up in his helicopter, with bodyguards, and said in perfect English: ʻI do hope your photographs are a success, gentlemen, but please forgive me, I have a meeting in Zurich.ʼ He then promptly buggered off… the plane in the picture was his spare.
“The spread of two cars by Lake Maggiore brings back memories of falling in at 6am, while trying to keep off the condensation. The brochure designer was asleep in the back seat!”
The twilight image of the Coupé in a Turin piazza made me fall in love wit
