BMW 2002 Hommage Concept: Paying Tribute to an Icon

This is a year brim-full of anniversaries for BMW. First, it’s the company’s centenary year. Second, it’s the 50th anniversary of the car that saved the postwar company from ruin: The gloriously proportioned, sweet-handling, surprisingly swift 2002 turns 50. So, after serving up the CSL Hommage last year to commemorate its other favorite car, the BMW design team has turned its attention to the 2002. And there is plenty of conjecture, even in this office, about whether they’ve done it well.

Based on the just-launched M2 coupe, the 2002 Hommage was revealed at the Villa d’Este Concorso d’Eleganza on the shores of Lake Como in Italy. Of all the cars in today’s BMW range, the M2 best captures the spirit of the 2002, particularly the 2002 Turbo that the design team chose to really soak up for inspirational vibes. (Never mind that the 2002 Turbo only turned up in late 1973—its wilder detailing gave the Hommage some more scope for wickedness.)

Sadly—or perhaps happily—there are no plans for a production version of the 2002 Hommage, nor are there even signs that any of its surfacing or detailing will ever see the inside of a BMW showroom. It is simply a pure styling exercise, which BMW lets its designers do once a year for Villa d’Este.

It’s controversial, though. Some of that is due to the limitations of the M2 donor car, which is obvious from the proportions and the untouched greenhouse. Whereas the 2002’s design was dominated by huge glass areas, a low beltline, and nanotubes for pillars, the M2’s body is almost the inverse of that, so it was never going to be a proportionally accurate modernization. There’s no getting around the M2’s thick pillars, smaller glass areas, and much, much higher waistline. The Hommage runs the same chassis architecture as the M2 and is less than an inch wider and longer.

It carries over the M2’s entire driveline, and, while BMW refuses to talk about the details of the 2002 Hommage’s rear-drive mechanical package (“It’s just about design, people,” they might say), it should run to 60 mph in about 4.2 seconds. Or it could if this design property wasn’t speed-governed to 19 mph. That’s because it’s full of fragile bits, some of which were stuck on mere hours before its debut, and BMW doesn’t want them all falling off. Still, the turbocharged 3.0-liter inline six-cylinder engine, code-named N55B30T0, gives it 365 horsepower and 369 lb-ft of torque. Standard M2 spec, in other words.

The designers focused on upping the crazy on this blue, fat-tired anniversary gift with the wide wheel arches, the crazy-deep front splitter, and enormous air-intake and -outlet openings, some of which appear to be venting nothing in particular (unless maybe the stylists imagine air-cooling the door handles).

“Exactly 50 years ago, the 02 range kick-started an era of success for BMW,” said Adrian van Hooydonk, the senior vice president of BMW Group Design. “This compact coupe is one of the vehicles which made the brand what it is today. The 2002 sat at the top of the range and was the first series-produced car anywhere in Europe to come with turbo technology. That set the seal on the coupe as a genuine sports car. At the same time the 2002 Turbo was at the technological vanguard of engine development at BMW. The BMW 2002 Hommage is our way of raising a glass to all these achievements.”

Plenty of visual cues link the concept to the original 2002 Turbo, but some would suggest they don’t match up with the original’s distinct delicacy and lightness. The Hommage looks heavy and cladded, especially from the front. There is a toe-cutting front splitter and an enormous air intake for the engine flanked by two more for the brakes. The grille carries the forward-leaning “shark nose” styling of the best 1960s BMWs, and there are even pronounced castellations on either side of the hood, plus a sharp crease in the middle.

The most controversial part of its design, at least internally at BMW, is the choice to abandon BMW’s ubiquitous quad-headlight front face. Instead, the Hommage strives to suggest the 2002-style single outboard round lights on each side. In a nod to the headlights of the period, the design team has also given each headlight a distinctly yellow tint. They’re not exactly round, but they are singular.

What it hasn’t done is make the reversed “Turbo” badge (originally meant to give the 2002 Turbo added rearview-mirror cred on autobahns) obvious. It’s there, but you have to search for it, and this slow show car would never be seen in the mirrors of the car ahead—which pretty much obviates the point of displaying it in reverse, doesn’t it?

Also gone is the 2002’s signature, full-body chrome molding, but there’s a reason for that. Sort of. BMW brand design boss Karim Habib insisted that the chrome strip would not work with the 2002 Hommage’s more modern materials, but it’s alluded to with a carbon-fiber strip that runs down each side and wraps around the trunklid. It even dives behind the fat front wheel arch and re-emerges to house the 2002-inspired indicator above the headlight.

Besides being an unabashed nod to the original 2002 Turbo’s prominent design feature, the carbon strip breaks up the 2002 Hommage into its upper and lower halves. Below it, the car is painted in high-gloss Space Race Metal (light blue), while there’s another tip of the cap to 1970s racing ideas in the matte finish applied to the top half. Its wheels bulge out even further than they do in the M2 coupe, with Habib’s team creating distinctive wheel arches to accommodate the 20-inch wheels and tires, and it also gets gold-painted M brake calipers. Just the thing needed to stop from 19 mph.

In tribute to the 1970s edition, the top of the trunklid has a prominent spoiler to enhance downforce, while the M2’s quad tailpipes are unmistakable beneath the Hommage’s rear bumper.

While BMW turned the corner as a company with the lightweight, cheaply developed, sweet handling 2002, the 2002 Turbo arrived just in time for the global oil crisis, so only 1672 of them were built. Nevertheless, it remains one of the era’s premier accessible fast cars, with a KKK turbocharger and mechanical fuel injection helping push out 170 horsepower and 177 lb-ft of torque. BMW claimed it could sprint to 60 mph in less than eight seconds and topped out at 132 mph.

The 2002 Hommage continues BMW’s tradition of non-production concept cars at the Villa d’Este Concorso, including last year’s CSL Hommage, the Vision Future Luxury concept in 2014, and the Gran Lusso Pininfarina collaboration in 2013.