MY FEEDLY: This Is The Only Chevrolet Camaro “Europo Hurst” In The World

The Chevrolet Camaro “Europo Hurst” is a car that even many Camaro diehards have never heard of, it’s the only one that was ever made and it was shaped by hand in Italy rather than Detroit.

The Europo Hurst Camaro came to be in the mid-1970s when Chevrolet sent a second generation Camaro to the workshops of Pietro Frua, one of Italy’s leading car designers. Frua had designed and overseen the design of a staggering array of vehicles including cars for Maserati, Fiat, Studebaker, Volvo, Glas, AC, and many more.

In 1976 its very likely that Chevrolet were asking themselves what was next for the Camaro. The Camaro had first exploded onto the scene in 1966 as a new competitor for the Ford Mustang, it enjoyed strong sales and started a rivalry in the pony car market that persists to this day.

Much like the Mustang, the Camaro struggled a little once the second generation model was introduced. In the same way that it’s always hard for a band to follow up a hit album, it proved challenging for America’s automakers to successfully release follow up versions of their hit pony cars.

Chevrolet introduced the new Camaro early in 1970. Although the second generation Camaro is beloved by many its styling didn’t have quite the same broad appeal as its predecessor, and as the 1973 Oil Crisis hit and American emissions laws became ever tighter the car became considerably less appealing to most American car buyers.

It was at this moment that Chevrolet turned to Pietro Frua, maybe it was a Hail Mary pass and maybe it was just a decision borne out of curiosity to see what he would come up with, but an agreement was reached and a Camaro was shipped over to Italy so work could begin.

The car was a 1976 Chevrolet Camaro fitted with a 350 cu. in. small block V8 and a 4-speed manual transmission. As with all Camaros of the era the car also had A-arm front suspension and a solid rear axle on leaf springs in the rear.

The design that Pietro Frua and his team came up with has been described in a wide variety of ways, few of them complimentary. The styling is vastly different to the Camaro with the exception of the tail lights, it has some similarities to previous Frua designs like the Frua Dodge Challenger Special, the Frua Lamborghini Espada ‘Faena’, and perhaps the Frua Momo Mirage of 1972.

If the executives of Chevrolet wanted a totally new design they certainly got their money’s worth. It seems the car wasn’t shown particularly broadly and many don’t even know that it exists, though an owner did show the car at the 2003 Concorso Italiano to a bemused audience.

The car now appears to be in original, preserved condition with a little patina but nothing significant. It’s being offered for sale as part of the Mitosinka Collection in September with no reserve price and no estimate – it really is anyone’s guess how much it might go for.

It’s obviously impossible for a vehicle to be more rare than being the only one in existence, and I’m sure there’ll be no shortage of car collectors in the United States and around the world that would love to add something as unusual and largely unknown as the Europo Hurst Camaro by Frua.

If you’d like to see more of the car or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing.