Bruno Sacco, one of the most popular Italian car designers of all time, whose name is inextricably linked to Mercedes, died yesterday at the age of 90 (he would have been 91 in November). Born in Udine in 1933, he joined the Star’s style centre in 1958, after experience at Ghia and Pininfarina.
He remained in Stuttgart until 1999, the year of his retirement, where he was head of Mercedes design from 1975, creating some of the company’s most iconic models.
The most important models
Among Sacco’s early work, perhaps the most important is the Mercedes SL ‘Pagoda’ 113 of the early 1960s, later followed by the Mercedes 600, the star’s flagship at the time. Models that saw the Italian designer as part of the working group under the guidance of Friedrich Geiger.
The big turning point came in 1975 with his appointment as head of Mercedes Styling, a role that, as mentioned, Bruno would leave in 1999 to retire.
To name all the models designed in his 24-year career would be impossible, but among the most important works we cannot fail to mention first and foremost the Mercedes G-Class, the iconic off-roader born in 1979 capable of crossing eras while keeping its style practically intact.
However, it is the Mercedes 190 of 1982 – of which almost 1.9 million units were produced – that made Sacco most proud. The ‘baby Mercedes’ later became the C-Class over the years.
One cannot fail to mention the 1997 Mercedes A-Class, the company’s first front-wheel-drive model with peculiar mechanics and a difficult start due to the failure of the moose test. It was a real success, with 1.1 million units sold.
The Mercedes SLK and CLK were also born from the pencil of Bruno, sports cars capable of turning the style not only of the company but of their segments, like the Mercedes E-Class of 1996 (210 series), later converted into an estate version.
Finally, the MMC smart, the revolutionary two-seater citycar produced not under the Mercedes brand, but the child of Bruno’s stylistic direction.
