Aston announce new Zagato – with £7.2million buy one get one free deal

For that UK tax-paid price you’d expect something special and you get it: a continuation version of the DB4 GT Zagato – in original form among the greatest and most valuable of Aston sports racers – and the latest, yet-to-be-revealed Zagato version of the new DBS Superleggera.

The DBS GT Zagato, hinted at only by a rough drawing of the front end, will be road legal and made at Gaydon. Already Aston’s GT flagship with its twin-turbocharged V12 delivering 715bhp, the DBS GT Z version will get a signature Zagato design makoever with, we are promised, an “amplified physique, dramatically truncated tail and fresh interpretation of the iconic double-bubble roof”. Along with what we are told is a striking front grille treatment.

A Zagato edition of the flagship Aston follows on from Zagato’s coupe, roadster, speedster and shooting bake versions of the DBS’s predecessor, the Vanquish. But with just 19 of the new one to be made, Aston says it will become the rarest of all the modern-era Aston Martin Zagatos. Owners will have to wait a while to get it though: first deliveries won’t be until the end of 2020.

Owners may get the first half of their dynamic duo, the DB4 GT Zagato Continuation, before then; deliveries for this begin at the end of 2019. Hand-built using traditional techniques at Aston’s home in Newport Pagnell, the latter-day DB4 GT Zagato will be track-only, following on from the run of 25 continuation versions of the DB4 GT announced in 2015, and also made at Newport Pagnell. Aston has not made a continuation version of the Zagato-bodied lightweight version before.

Just 19 DB4 GT Zagatos were made in period, informing the number of DBZ Centenary Collection pairs available. The car’s racing success against the Ferrari 250 GTO in the 1960s, its iconic place in British motorsport and rarity today make original examples among the world’s most sought-after and valuable  cars. One of the most celebrated examples, the ex-Jim Clark ‘2 VEV’, sold for £10 million at Bonhams Festival of Speed auction earlier this year, making it the most valuable British car ever to be offered at a European auction.

Aston says the two cars together perfectly bookend Aston’s 58-year history of partnership with the Italian coachbuilder. Aston design chief Marek Reichman said: “Aston Martin and Zagato is a uniquely dynamic union, one that unites the former’s love of proportion and clean, simple forms with the latter’s daring and maverick eye. Never afraid to push the boundaries, the partnership has resulted in some fabulous cars.”