The Alfa Romeo SZ has always split opinion – while the recipe of a lightweight, rear-drive coupé with a brawny Busso V6 has universal appeal, those bizarre looks are too much for some. For owners Jacob and Stacey, none of that matters: their SZ is part of the family.
Fun fact number one: the Alfa Romeo SZ’s name stands for ‘Sprint Zagato’. Fun fact number two: the Alfa Romeo SZ was not designed by Zagato. Even if it wasn’t right there in the name, you’d be forgiven for thinking this peculiar-looking coupé was penned by Italy’s most idiosyncratic carrozzeria. Look at what Zagato did come out with around this time – the Aston Martin V8 Zagato, the Autech Stelvio, the one-off Ferrari FZ93 – and the SZ, with its bizarre proportions, resolute angularity, and almost brutalist style, fits right in.
The fact is, though, that the famed purveyors of double-bubble roofs (which the SZ lacks – a hint that all is not as it seems with that name) had a side hustle around this time of not designing, but building niche, smaller-production models for other manufacturers. They’d previously done the same with the Spider version of the Lancia Beta, which was a Pininfarina design, but the SZ was penned in-house at Alfa. In fact, the basic shape was crafted by Robert Opron, a man with a track record of unconventionally beautiful cars, most notably the Citroen SM.
Conceived in an effort by Alfa to reassert itself as a serious player in the modern rear-drive sports car market, the starkly angular SZ launched in 1989, and was perhaps a culmination of all the stylistic excess that had been building throughout the 1980s. It was a fine way for the decade’s automotive design tendencies to bow out before giving way to the pebbly smooth aesthetics of the 1990s.
It also characterised the ’80s obsession with the pre-internet digital world: from the era of eight-bit video games, brick-sized mobiles and the square-headed characters in the video for Dire Straits’ ‘Money for Nothing’ came the equally boxy SZ, the first car designed entirely using CAD/CAM. This thing is basically Giorgio Moroder with four wheels.
In the years since, so much of the discourse around the SZ has revolved around its styling – far from all of it positive. With its almost hunchbacked profile, slab sides and insectoid sextet of headlights, it’s gained the nickname of ‘Il Mostro’ – The Monster. It was a bitter pill to swallow for those who yearned for the days of curvaceous, swoopy Alfas.
But here’s the thing – look at what’s in vogue right now. Mullets. Pit Vipers. Everything we once thought was kitsch and gaudy about the late 1980s is suddenly cool, and doesn’t the SZ fit right in all over again?
If you still can’t get on board with the looks, though, then what’s underneath might be more to your taste. The SZ was based on the 75, Alfa’s compact exec saloon of the era. Already, this was a good start. Alfa’s last rear-drive saloon until the current Giulia, the 75 featured a weight-distribution-friendly transaxle layout.
The SZ wasn’t a simple rebody, though. The chassis was shortened, and the brakes and suspension were transplanted from the 75 Turbo Evolution, a competition variant that ran in the US-based IMSA championship.
Then, of course, there was the engine. Enough’s been written about Alfa’s long-lived and gloriously musical ‘Busso’ V6 that there’s nothing much worth adding about it – it’s simply intoxicating. It appears in 3.0-litre, 12-valve configuration in the SZ, making 204bhp as standard. The bodywork was made from revolutionary for the time composite fibre, keeping mass down to 1280kg, as well as protecting it from Alfasud-style rot. The healthy power output and lithe weight meant 0-60 in 7 seconds and a top speed of 152mph – comparable figures to an S2 Porsche 944.
Just over 1,000 SZs were produced between 1989 and 1991, all left-hand drive and in Alfa Red, with the exception of one black car commissioned for Andrea Zagato, CEO of the eponymous firm. Once SZ production was done, a convertible version, the RZ (Roadster Zagato), was built between 1992 and 1994 – something around 280 of these were built.
This SZ, proudly bearing the ‘Il Mostro’ name on its rear plate, is something of a family heirloom for its owners, Jacob and Stacey. “My dad bought the car 26 years ago,” explains Jacob. “I was one month old, and I went with him and my mum on the Eurotunnel to pick the car up from a car park in France. I’ve known it for my whole life.”
The car is now in Jacob’s hands, approaching triple-figure kilometres. Naturally, a 30-plus-year-old Alfa Romeo isn’t the best companion for daily use, so the SZ comes out for special trips – Goodwood, Le Mans, All Italia in the Yard, and so on. Daily duties are handled by an eminently sensible BMW 520d Touring. Jacob also has a 997 Porsche 911 Carrera S that’s gradually being fitted out with GT3 parts in order to create a sort of 997 interpretation of the more recent GT3 Touring concept.
What’s the Milanese monster actually like when it does come out to play? “It’s running a little bit more power than it used to,” says Jacob. “It’s got lumpier cams, and a racing ECU.” The latter comes from the SZ Trofeo, a racing version built in low numbers for one of the weirder one-make race series that’s ever been conceived.
“It’s brilliant to drive,” continues Jacob. “It’s got that proper mechanical feel. It needs a respray – the paint’s blistered which is unfortunately common on these. The only place it can rust is around the rear windscreen, and it has rusted there, so it needs that repairing. That’ll probably be done over the winter.”
What of the longer term? Jacob and Stacey are expecting their first child, so it’s hoped that the SZ will become treasured by a third generation of their family. “If this one’s into cars, it’ll be hers, if not, it’ll be the next one. It’ll definitely be in the family forever.”
This is one of the beautiful things about cars – their ability to become an extra member of a family, akin to a beloved pet or an ancestral home. It doesn’t matter if a car’s been as publicly controversial as the SZ has over the years – to the people who care for it, it can be everything.
