Working for a brand like Lamborghini is a designer’s dream, getting to design angular works of art that go 200 miles per hour. At this year’s Monterey Car Week, the Raging Bull revealed its latest “Few-Off” supercar called the Lamborghini Fenomeno, which is based on the Revuelto and follows models like the Veneno, Centenario, and Sián.
CarBuzz sat down with Mitja Borkert, Design Director at Lamborghini, to discuss how projects like the Fenomeno come to fruition, and how he comes up with new ideas for the next line of Raging Bull. Borkert explained that there is a balance when designing cars for a brand like Lamborghini. Yes, the styling needs to be wild and eye-catching, but there are limits to what can be produced.
“I have a lot of fantasies and a lot of imagination, but for those ideas, you need to understand that Lamborghini is a small company. We are agile as a brand, so I’m never excluding any idea.”
– Mitja Borkert, Lamborghini design director
Crazy, Unseen Ideas
As a designer, Borkert says, “I’m never running out of ideas. It’s my positive problem.” In fact, there are so many of these ideas, Lamborghini could almost create a book with the unused designs. Borkert referenced a book released in 2020, which showed off 15 previously never-before-seen Porsche concept cars that were never shown to the public.
“My job is to amplify the ideation and the ideas out of my team,” he said. “We are not yet at a moment where we have a book like Porsche Unseen, but be sure that in the last 10 years, we have some crazy ideas that no one has ever seen.”
With the Fenomeno, Borkert says he wanted the car to have a “recognizable Lamborghini silhouette line” as well as a “spaceship shape” from the Countach. “I wanted a car that’s recognizable from far away. They need to see this car and recognize a Lamborghini,” he explained. “You can always put a Lamborghini in the middle of three cars, and know which one is a Lamborghini.”
No V12 Off-Roader.
Among those “crazy ideas that no one has ever seen,” Borkert mentioned one that we would love to see but will likely never see the light of day. When asked if he would ever design a V12-powered off-road vehicle in the same vein as the Huracán Sterrato, Borkert said, “you are sitting in front of a designer who is very creative. In my brain, nothing is not existing.”
In fact, Borkert even told CarBuzz, “we have tried one,” referencing a V12 off-roader. “I have photoshops with an Aventador as an off-roader, but it did not work. The original Sterrato fit perfectly to the V10 because it feels like a rally car. You need a very compact layout for a car such as the Sterrato. And the V12, the wheelbase is too long and would be too heavy.”
Sounds optimistic at least, yes? But before you get too excited (like we did), he then poured some ice-cold water by shutting it down, full stop.
“I can completely, officially say ‘no,’ there is nothing in the plans” for a V12 off-roader. “But maybe in 50 years,” he joked.
