If this 1962-63 concept had found approval, the 1965 Mustang could have been a much smaller car. Meet the Ford Allegro, a European-style two-place coupe.
As we’ve seen, the development of the 1965 Mustang took many forms, with multiple Ford styling teams simultaneously working up a number of ideas. This concept began in 1962 as the Avventura, a 2+2 (with the +2 passengers facing the rear) designed by veteran Ford stylist Don Richard DeLaRossa, which then evolved into a two-place coupe called the Allegro.
Built on a shortened Falcon platform with a tidy 100-inch wheelbase, the Allegro was relatively tiny: just 169 inches long and 49 inches tall with a track width of 51 inches. There was no engine or drivetrain installed, some reports say, though the vehicle was intended to accommodate either a 144 cubic-inch Falcon six or a Taunus V4 coupled to an automatic transmission. Originally painted a pale gold, it was then redone in Candy Apple Red for a presentation to the automotive press in Dearborn on August 27, 1963.
As we now know, by that time the plans were already firmly in place in for the production 1965 Mustang, a considerably larger car with mass appeal among American car buyers. When the Mustang made its official debut at the New York World’s Fair in April of 1964, it was displayed alongside the Allegro and a number of Ford prototype and production cars.
The Allegro’s cockpit featured a number of innovations. The seats, featuring built-in retractable seat belts, were fixed to the floor while the accelerator and brake pedals could be moved moved forward and back three inches to suit driver comfort. Meanwhile, the steering column was mounted on a cantilevered yoke that could adjust up/down and fore/aft. The adjustments included a memory function that the driver could access with the push of a button.
While the production Mustang was already well on its way, the Allegro had a brief career of its own. Along with the World’s Fair exhibit, it was featured in Ford print ads and in a 1964 factory promotional film. Styling and the Experimental Car (you can watch it here). It also had a cameo in a 1966 science-fiction sex comedy starring Jerry Lewis, Way . . Way Out, where it briefly appears with several more futuristic-looking Ford and GM concept cars and seems to run under its own power (below).
In 1967 the Allegro turned up one more time as the Allegro II (below). Reworked by Gene Bordinat’s styling crew, now it was a topless two-place roadster painted a deep metallic gold, with a wraparound plastic windscreen and a low-profile targa hoop. The adjustable cockpit features remained unchanged. The Allegro II was featured in several American car magazines in late 1967, including Car Life, where the editors remarked that it reminded them of the Lotus Europa, possibly due to its tiny proportions. What became of the Allegro/Allegro II after that, we don’t know.
A rather different car to the 1970s Austin of the same name.
My knuckles hurt just looking at the protruding nacelle and shifter proximity. The gold paint really emphasizes the contours around the headlights and grille and immediately brought to mind the Mustang 2.
Similar to the Pinto front end as well.
The roofline looks a bit like the Sunbeam Alpine Harrington LeMans coupes. A little too tall for the length. But if it had gone into production we’d be used to it. I think Harrington did some Sprite coupes too.
The proportions are wrong, imo. Too much hood, not enough car. If they’d concentrated on the V4 and used its’ compactness to radically shorten the hood within the same overall length – the base of the windshield should be roughly even with the top of the fender crease – they’d have been able to build a full 5-seater in the same footprint easily. Throw in a hatchback as well.
But then, the production Mustang would’ve benefitted from being locked into the Falcon’s dash-to-axle dimension, or at least that would’ve spared us a decade of cars with too much wasted underhood space and too-cramped back seats and trunks (even in full-size family sedans!) until the 1973 oil crisis restored sanity.