This is something rather special. The new Morgan Midsummer Coupé is the next stage of a collaboration between Italian design house Pininfarina and purveyors of hand-hewn sports cars from Worcestershire. It follows on from 2024’s Morgan Midsummer barchetta, fifty of which have been built and delivered over the past couple of years.
Morgan Midsummer Coupé
The Midsummer Coupé continues this blend of exotic design and handcraft, only this time in the form of a fixed head coupé. This time the commission is even rarer, with only nine cars being made available worldwide, in addition to this, Car 0, the so-called ‘artist’s proof’.
Morgan Midsummer Coupé
Morgan describes their approach as ‘contemporary coachbuilding’, and there’s certainly a lot here that wouldn’t be possible in a conventional car factory, let alone on the regular Morgan production line. Even though the Malvern Link facility already goes above and beyond what’s possible, the Midsummer Coupé is a showcase of technology and craft.
Shaping Car 0 at the Morgan factory
The latter is most evident in the hand-formed centre body, manipulated and shaped on the traditional English wheel system for hundreds of hours to achieve the precise curves and radii that shape the body. Panels are joined by solid aluminium riveting, a method dating back to early aircraft manufacturing. Digital scanning is used throughout the process to ensure complete accuracy.
The car also sits on an aluminium chassis, Morgan’s own new generation CXV Aluminium Platform – as seen in the Supersport and new Supersport 400, as well as the machine-billeted aluminium A-pillars.
The roof glass is installed in Car 0
What differentiates the Midsummer Coupé from its production siblings is the glazed roof and rear profile. The tapering tail sweeps up and over the passenger compartment, with four individual glass panels bisected by a line of chrome.
The treatment is both classically elegant and in keeping with the familiar Morgan aesthetic and cutting edge, in that the fixed glass panels are bonded directly into the aluminium roof structure, adding stiffness and saving weight (the car is on 2.5% heavier than a Supersport with a hardtop).
The first Morgan Midsummer Coupé comes together
This fixed-head format is very different in character to the open-top and removable hard-top Morgan, as well as the completely open original Midsummer. A large luggage compartment will no doubt be supplied with specially fitted luggage in at least a few of the nine customer cars.
In practical terms, this also makes the Midsummer Coupé even better suited to everyday use than the Supersport, already one of the most practical day-to-day Morgans ever made. It also allows for some newly crafted components that depart from traditional Morgan details. These include the door handles integrated into the aluminium belt line, and the streamlined side window graphic, with a droppable window section.
Inside Midsummer Coupé Car 0
The rear luggage compartment of the Midsummer Coupé
The Coupé sits on 19-inch forged aluminium wheels that can take a contrasting paint colour, while the interior of Car 0 has a teak and pale leather trim inspired by nautical design. Future configurations will be completely determined by the customer. The Midsummer features the new Morgan gear selector seen in the Supersport 400 (the car has a BMW engine and gearbox). Roof-mounted window switches and teak-inlaid sun visors attach to an aluminium rail.
Morgan now has its own bespoke aluminium gear selector
Jonathan Wells is Morgan’s Chief Design Officer. He describes the Midsummer Coupé as ‘the culmination of an extraordinary creative journey. What began as a celebration of coachbuilding, craftsmanship and collaboration has evolved into one of the most ambitious and rewarding projects we’ve ever undertaken,’ he continues, ‘Working alongside the team at Pininfarina, together with our own designers and engineers, has been both a privilege and immensely rewarding. Midsummer Coupé marks the closing chapter of that remarkable collaboration, but it also represents a defining moment in Morgan’s coachbuilding story.’
Car 0 is just the start. The nine cars that follow offer customers a rich canvas for their own tastes, guided by Morgan’s team. All cars will bear the Pininfarina Fuoriserie emblem (‘out of series’); beyond that, they will ‘share a common foundation yet [be] entirely unique in their execution.’
Morgan Midsummer Coupé
As Morgan’s Managing Director Matthew Hole explains, ‘the Midsummer Coupé began with a conversation. A client came to us with an idea and, rather than asking how closely we could meet that brief, we asked ourselves how far we could take it. Special projects [give us] the opportunity to apply our skills in different ways. Working closely with each client, we can explore new ideas, refine new techniques and continue to develop the knowledge that defines Morgan coachbuilding today.’
The approach that will increasingly shape more and more output from the Pickersleigh Road factory as Morgan invests in skills and options that only it can provide thanks to the scale of the production process and the close integration between design, engineering and manufacturing. There are very few companies who can create this kind of richly evocative automotive special project.
Morgan Midsummer Coupé