Renault has been digging through its back catalog lately, and somebody in the design department clearly found the good stuff. The French carmaker’s latest creation takes one of the company’s most famous cars and reimagines it as a compact electric coupe.
Meet the Renault 8 Gordini Concept, a two-seat, rear-wheel-drive EV inspired by the legendary Renault 8 Gordini of the 1960s. Unlike its boxy four-door ancestor, the new interpretation sits low, wide, and decidedly aggressive.
The transformation isn’t purely cosmetic, either. Renault has given the concept a 270-horsepower electric motor driving the rear wheels, maintaining one of the defining characteristics of the original Gordini.
Unfortunately, Renault isn’t announcing a new production sports car. The company describes the 8 Gordini Concept as an exploratory project created as part of a series celebrating its heritage ahead of the opening of the Renault Collections museum in Flins, France.
From Four-Door Sedan To Two-Seat Coupe
The original Renault 8 Gordini arrived in 1964 with a 95-hp engine mounted at the rear and power sent to the rear wheels. It became an accessible performance machine and helped establish the blue paint and twin white stripes as instantly recognizable Gordini signatures.
Its modern descendant is radically different in proportion. The concept measures 4.12 meters long, 1.88 meters wide, and only 1.27 meters tall, with 19-inch wheels up front and larger 20-inch wheels at the rear.
Renault describes the design as influenced by the “café racer” movement, stripping away unnecessary visual clutter while emphasizing the underlying form. The carbon-bodied coupe gets dramatically widened, squared-off wheel arches, six circular headlights, and a muscular rear end designed to visually emphasize its rear-driven layout.
Plenty Of Retro Details Remain
The signature blue paint takes inspiration from the original’s Bleu de France, using a three-layer finish to create greater depth. Renault’s famous double white Gordini stripes are also present, although they’ve become structural elements of the design rather than simple graphics.
Other references are subtler. The original’s rectangular wheel arches, recessed waistline, shell-shaped mirrors, and ventilation grilles have all been reinterpreted, while the six headlights recall the rally-specification Renault 8 Gordini.
Renault even redesigned the Gordini script while preserving details from the historic badge. A new “8” emblem constructed from eight individual segments provides another small nod to the car’s identity.
The Interior Might Be Even Better
Renault resisted the temptation to cover the dashboard with a giant rectangular touchscreen. Instead, six circular digital displays appear to float above a horizontal brushed-aluminum dashboard inspired by the original car’s instrumentation.
Brushed aluminum replaces much of the plastic you’d expect in a modern cabin, while Alcantara and blue corduroy cover sections of the interior. Two bucket seats complete a cockpit Renault says was intentionally designed with as few distractions as possible.
The Renault 8 Gordini Concept will appear at the Paris Motor Show in October before eventually joining Renault’s heritage collection. Renault hasn’t announced production plans, which is unfortunate because this is one retro revival that deserves to escape the museum.