Lancia Prisma: Forgotten Italian stallion

This brand was one of the greatest giant-killers in the history of motorsport before it was gobbled up by one of the giants. Some Aussies are keeping the dream alive.

1983 Lancia Prisma

Vincenzo Lancia was a carmaker as romantics would have carmakers be. Born in 1881, Vincenzo appeared destined for a career in accountancy until, in his late teens, he joined budding car maker Giovanni Ceirano.

Ceirano’s 1898 “Welleyes” car would become, in 1899, the first product of the newly-founded Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino – better known as Fiat.

Vincenzo Lancia flourished as Fiat engineer, test driver and racing driver before founding his own carmaking enterprise in 1906. From the first Lancia “Alpha” of 1907, the brand would be known for engineering innovation and giant-killing motorsport feats with near-standard models.

Led by son Gianni after Vincenzo’s death in 1937, Lancia’s dalliance with Formula 1 in the mid-1950s and its complex, costly production models led to the family ceding control and eventually to a 1969 takeover by Fiat.

A new generation would recognise Lancia’s rallying success with the wedge-shaped Stratos through the mid-1970s, the Group B 037 and Delta S4 of the early-1980s and the Group A Delta Integrale that won six consecutive world constructors’ championships from 1987-92.

Meanwhile, Lancia’s road cars were increasingly based on mainstream Fiat models. The brand bowed out from Australia in 1985, its final model — the handsome Beta and HPE coupes — already a byword for body rust.

Gaetano Florio and his Lancia Prisma.

Coincidentally, it was around this time that Italian-born, Sydney-raised Gaetano Florio had a two-year sojourn in Sicily.

“That move was dictated by my father, who wanted to move back to his homeland,” says Florio, 52, a food sales manager from Sydney’s inner-west. “I grew up in the backyard of Sydney’s Little Italy, but we were all packed up and moved to Giardini Naxos.”

Florio, whose surname is synonymous with a Sicilian wine dynasty and the Targa Florio road race, had his automotive world expanded from Australian V8s. “The Autobianchi A112 Abarth, the Delta Integrale, Renault 5 Turbo, the Peugeot 205 GTI — and the supercars, Ferrari’s 288 GTO, Porsche the 959 — it was heaven!”

The Lancia Prisma, a sedan version of the Delta hatchback, is not an especially collectable model, but this 1983 example’s Australian rarity, genuine Ermenegildo Zegna cloth interior and $4000 price tag made it l’amore a prima vista for Florio when he saw it advertised in 2018.

“It was imported from the UK in the early-2000s as a one-owner car with all the original paperwork,” says Florio. “It sat in a private collection for 13 years and unfortunately, developed a lot of serious corrosion.”

Florio had previously owned and restored a variety of 1980s Alfa Romeos. “I love watching those restoration shows on Foxtel and I wanted to do a project together with my son, who’s 24 and a spray painter.”

The Lancia’s bare-metal restoration took 18 months, with virtually every panel needing metal cut and welded as replacements were no longer available. Florio estimates he’s put $30,000 into his Prisma, but estimates that it’s “probably worth $40-$50,000”.

“I love its uniqueness and its Italian-ness, it’s not like any other car,” he says.

“I take it through Little Italy, the people who know the brand are excited to see it and they give it the thumbs-up. But the fact that so many people don’t know what a Lancia is, that’s the heartbreaking part of it.”