A Key Concept Car From Hyundai's History Has Been Painstakingly Restored
In 1974, Hyundai debuted one of its first ever concept cars, the Pony Coupe. It was an angular two door styled by none other than Giorgetto Giugiaro, the man responsible for designing the first Volkswagen Golf, and countless other automotive classics. Reportedly, it was work on the Hyundai Pony Coupe that inspired Giugiaro to design the iconic DeLorean.
Now, nearly 50 years after the car first appeared at the Turin Motor Show, it has been restored back to its former glory. For the restoration Hyundai chose the best man for the job, its original designer Giorgetto Giugiaro (and his son Fabrizio), to head up the effort on the restoration.
The effort to restore the original Pony Coupe started in the fall of last year and the project was the result of countless hours to get it looking like it did back in the 1970s. Even as the age of electric vehicles rapidly comes upon the automotive world, Hyundai doesn't want to forget where it came from.
Celebrating Hyundai's history
The Pony Coupe was a tremendously important car for Hyundai and one of the main reasons the brand is a household name all over the world. Although the car never made its way to the United States, it served as Hyundai's beachhead to start selling cars globally. The production Pony, inspired by the concept, became the first ever car produced in Korea and the success of Hyundai at the time has been credited with saving Korea from certain economic disaster in the decades after the Korean War.
Euisun Chung, the Executive Chair of Hyundai Motor Group, says: "Despite the poor industrial environment in the 1970s, my grandfather and Hyundai's Founding Chairman Ju-young Chung poured his heart and soul into rebuilding Korea's economy and improving the lives of its people after the devastating Korean War. He finally realized his vision of making Korea a country capable of developing its own vehicles with perfection. I express my sincere gratitude to everyone from both Italy and Korea who played a critical role in the success of Pony."
To a lot of people, the restored Hyundai Pony Coupe is a cool realization of one of the most iconic concept cars of the 1970s. To Hyundai, it's a memorial to everything the brand has gone through to become the giant it is today.