Have we all come to terms with the existence of the Lamborghini Urus yet? Ignore the bonkers LM002 for a second, and the idea of a more practical, four-door, almost sensible Lamborghini seemed somewhat heinous.
It turns out that the Urus is a pretty good thing in isolation, but you know it’s a car that’s built because it has to exist in a world where people want SUVs rather than a car it truly wants to build. A practical daily to complement the Centenario hiding in the Sheikh’s garage.
Yet, the four-door, family-friendly Lamborghini wasn’t an entirely alien concept to us by the time the Urus arrived in 2017. In fact, the car that laid its foundations and ultimately never came to fruition remains one of motoring’s biggest ‘What if?’ moments.
In 2008, if you wanted a Lamborghini, your options were pretty limited. You could for the two-door, two-seat Murcielago if you made a lot of money, the two-door, two-seat Gallardo if you made less money or the two-door, two-seat Reventon if you made so much money the concept of expenditure didn’t even register in your consciousness.
That would’ve been a fine line-up if you were an independent Italian supercar manufacturer dodging bankruptcies by taking the local tax collector out for a joyride and nice lunch every other month, but it wouldn’t continue to cut the mustard under the stewardship of Audi. It had to diversify the brand to make something called ‘profit’.
Although the success of the Porsche Cayenne earlier in the decade would mean it’d be all but inevitable every high-end manufacturer would chase the SUV gold, 2008 was still a time when purists had their ways a little bit. The idea of a more practical Lamborghini then was seemingly sacrilege, until we saw what that could look like.
Lamborghini Estoque, doors open
‘That’ being the utterly magnificent Estoque. It had its engine in the front, four doors and four seats yet absolutely everything else about it was typical Lamborghini.
It looked utterly mad with its Reventon/F-15 fighter jet-esque angles, gigantic menacing bonnet and haunced wheel arches. Oh, and that engine was the 5.2-litre V10 lifted from the Gallardo, so you could guarantee it would sound mad too.
Lamborghini even managed to translate the lunacy into the rear of the car. Bucket seats for your passengers? Sure, why not? Despite that, the interior looked realistic, as did the whole car in truth. It seemed ready for production.
Lamborghini Estoque, front
No surprise, as the Sant’Agata Bolognese firm stated its intentions to build the car. A practical car built by Lamborghini, and made in a fashion only Lamborghini could pull off.
Unfortunately, it being 2008, there was the small matter of a global recession that would pretty much wipe out any commercial viability for a four-door Lamborghini. As a result, plans to build the Estoque were shelved and although it was never outright stated, stealthily cancelled.
So it would take until 2017 for Lamborghini to realise its ambitions of making a more usable car, albeit an SUV rather than an utterly gorgeous saloon car, and you could probably put your house on the latter never happening, too. In case you hadn’t guessed, we’re still not over it.
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