Rare Corvettes · One of one

The Bertone Nivola

In 1990, three decades before the C8, an Italian design house took the Corvette's engine, moved it behind the driver, and showed the world a mid-engine Corvette. It came not from Detroit but from Bertone — and it was named after a man who died in 1953.

The 1990 Bertone Nivola concept, a bright yellow mid-engine Corvette-based coupe
The 1990 Bertone Nivola, based on the Corvette ZR-1 — its LT5 V8 relocated amidships. Photographed in the Bertone museum collection, now preserved by the Automotoclub Storico Italiano. Photo: Larry Stevens, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Zora Arkus-Duntov spent his career trying to put the Corvette's engine in the middle, and was overruled every time. So it is a fine irony that one of the most convincing mid-engine Corvettes of the 20th century was built by an Italian carrozzeria as a design exercise. At the 1990 Geneva Motor Show, Bertone unveiled the Nivola: a bright yellow two-seater built on the running gear of the brand-new Corvette ZR-1, with designer Marc Deschamps responsible for the shape.

The engine in the middle

Bertone took the ZR-1's crown jewel — the Lotus-developed, four-cam LT5 V8 — and did the one thing Chevrolet never would: moved it out from under the long hood and mounted it behind the cockpit, driving the rear wheels through a specially built ZF transaxle. The result was a genuine mid-engine layout with a rearward weight bias, wrapped in a low, curvaceous body with a removable roof panel that turned the coupĂ© into an open spider. Inside were true concept-car flourishes: the seats had no cushions — occupants sat directly on the shaped floor — and the doors hid a pair of luggage compartments.

Nivola at a glance

  • Built: one, by Bertone; debuted at the 1990 Geneva Motor Show
  • Designer: Marc Deschamps, for Bertone
  • Basis: Corvette ZR-1 — the 5.7L LT5 V8, relocated amidships with a ZF transaxle
  • Body: two-seat coupĂ© with a removable roof panel, convertible to a spider
  • Today: preserved in the ASI (Automotoclub Storico Italiano) Bertone collection

Named for the Flying Mantuan

The name is a tribute. Tazio Nuvolari — the greatest racing driver of the 1930s, nicknamed “Nivola” — raced in a signature yellow jersey, and the concept's vivid paint is a nod to it. It was a fitting badge for a car that, like Nuvolari himself, made a virtue of doing the improbable. Bertone's Nivola belongs on the same shelf as Zora's own Corvette Indy and CERV III: proof, decades early, that a mid-engine Corvette could be beautiful — a promise the C8 would finally keep in 2020.