If it hasn’t happened yet, it’s only a matter of time before your favourite supercar from your youth gets the restomod treatment. The BorromeodeSilva studio, previously responsible for the design of the Nardone 928 and Automobili Amos Futurista, has taken its pen to Lamborghini’s ’90s titan, the Diablo, for Eccentrica Cars.
Where do we begin? The design house and Eccentrica cite the Diablo GT as their inspiration for this project, and anyone who has ever seen pictures of a Diablo GT would likely concur. The blocky front intake, double hood scoops and copious dashes of carbon fibre are nods to the Diablo’s brief flirtations with motorsport. The later examples, anyway — not so much the Jota.
Eccentrica also took the liberty of extending the Diablo’s wheelbase and width ever so slightly, helping to push those chunky five spokes out to the corners and shorten up the overhangs.
It looks good from most angles. OK, the wheels might be a touch too large (or maybe that’s just the obscured centre locks playing tricks on my eyes) and the back is certainly busy. It’s obviously a law somewhere that these restomods have to incorporate LEDs wherever possible, but the red ring of death is starting to feel pretty tired as a taillight design, no?
The weird brass dish at the edge of the engine cover is the oddest detail. Eccentrica calls it a “teppenyaki plate,” and it supposedly covers “the most dangerous elements of the engine.” That engine, by the way, is still a V12 — one that produces 550 horsepower, right in line with the final Diablo model in the series, the VT 6.0. Carbon-fibre body panels allow Eccentrica’s Diablo to shed 35 kg for a 1,590 kg total.
I have less positive things to say of the Diablo restomod’s Instagram-bait interior, which seems a little out of step with the car’s ’90s roots. The original Diablo’s dashboard was of course no great work of art, but lopping most of it off and embedding 10 big-pixel LCD screens behind a massive aluminium plate would arguably better fit a tribute to the Vector W8 than Lamborghini’s last contribution to the 20th century.
Eccentrica is only planning to build 19 of these, and there’s no word on a price yet. Would you choose one over an actual Diablo, and all the pain and financial ruin one would entail?