The VW Karmann Ghia was born through the desire of W. Karmann GmbH, producers of the Beetle Cabriolet for VW, to produce a sports bodied car upon a reliable and tested chassis. Initial designs by Karmann were turned down by VW so because of the popularity of the Italian design studios at that time, Karmann turned to Luigi Segre of Ghia in Turin to produce a prototype which would satisfy VW.

The project started in 1950 and the plan and body designs were finally approved by VW in 1954 when they confirmed that a supply of chassis would be made available to the Karmann factory in Osnabruck. The press launch was held at the Kasino Hotel in Westfalen, close to Osnabruck, on 14 July 1955 and then the official launch at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September.

The car was mainly assembled by hand on purpose built jigs and was very labour intensive. It consisted of many panels and the external body joints being welded, then smoothed and lead filled to produce seamless joins.

It was expensive to build but benefited from the VW distribution and sales network to help market it. The car continued in series production from 1955 to 1974 undergoing, in typical VW fashion, many year by year improvements.

This neat white Karmann with a black roof is from 1963 and stands out with the white with brick-red interior. It was imported into the Netherlands in 2017. The Karmann has nice accessories such as the roof rack, blinds for the rear window and a red sun visor (not mounted). The Blaupunkt radio is also present.

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