The Fiat Coupé may never have existed if the Cadillac Allanté had been a success. That’s the hot take from Matteo Licata – aka Roadster Life – in one of his latest and most compelling YouTube videos.
Matteo explains how Pininfarina built an entire factory to assemble Allanté bodies, which were then flown across the Atlantic on specially modified Boeing 747s. General Motors dubbed it the ‘Allante Airbridge’, but for American buyers, the idea of an Italian-American convertible was a bridge too far.
Early cars suffered from leaks and quality issues, and the original 4.1-litre V8 lacked the power to give the Allanté any serious pull. Later updates – including a 4.5-litre Northstar V8, electronic suspension, and uprated brakes – turned the Allanté into a more convincing Cadillac, but by then, the damage had been done.
From Torino to Tipo
Sales never recovered, and the Allanté was quietly dropped in 1993 after just 21,430 units had been built. Coincidentally, 1993 is also the year the Fiat Coupé made its debut at the Brussels Motor Show.
As explored in this feature, the Coupé project had started back in 1990 under Leonardo Fioravanti at Fiat’s Centro Stile, before being taken over by Ermanno Cressoni, who had recently arrived from Alfa Romeo.
But the unsung hero is designer Chris Bangle. Speaking to Form Trends, Bangle recalled:
‘The project began when chief engineer Pietro Tronville – father of the Uno and the man who brought me from Opel to Fiat – called me into his office and explained all about how Pininfarina had this capacity in their plant in Torino because the Cadillac Allanté had tanked and they wanted to do a coupé on the Tipo platform.’
A failure that birthed a classic
So, without the failure of the Cadillac Allanté, there might never have been a Fiat Coupé. From the ashes of one flawed convertible rose one of the most distinctive coupes of the 1990s.
Watch Matteo’s Cadillac Allanté and Fiat Coupé to hear the story in his own words – a wonderfully authentic Italian take on two fascinating cars. Note: The original video has been removed, but there’s still plenty to enjoy on Matteo’s channel – check out the trailer below.
And if you're feeling nostalgic, you might also enjoy our Cadillac Allante retrospective: an ode to the misunderstood Italian-American boulevardier.
In total, Fiat built 72,762 Coupés, with around 10 percent making it to the UK. It may have been more successful than the Allanté, but in a way, we have Cadillac to thank for Fiat’s boldest coupe. God bless, America.
This post was revisited and updated in August 2025 to reflect the removal of the original video and to include links to related articles.
