Some $200,000 or €145,000 excluding taxes, transport costs and more importantly, the price for the donor Porsche Cayman that starts new from $52,600 in the US and from €51,385 in Germany for the base 275PS (271hp) model, is a whole lot of money, and it’s what Italy’s Studiotorino is asking for their new coachbuilt coupe named Moncenisio.

Studiotorino, which had teased the car that’s named after the first hill climb race in the world, the 1902 Susa-Moncenisio, last summer, says only 19 examples will be built to order, besides the 981 generation Cayman S-based model pictured here that will be available for client test drives.

The Italian studio leaves the Cayman’s internals untouched, placing its focus on the body panels and to some extent, the interior.

“The Moncenisio maintains the original structure, frame, mechanics, engine, emissions, safety and reliability characteristics of the vehicle of origin,” says Studiotorino. “Traditional Turin school methods of manual modeling and styling of the body, painting and interior trimming will be utilized,” the company adds.

The styling is not to everyone’s taste, and I’m under the impression that, the choice of tires and wheels, doesn’t really help either. According to the coachbuilder, the design “was inspired by the 1963 Porsche Type 904 and continues as well as evolves the styling of Studiotorino’s 2006 RK Coupé”.

One person who doesn’t feel warm about the Moncenisio is Carscoops reader Eric Therner, who tipped us off on the car even before Studiotorino told us about it:

“I really liked the first coachbuilt cars Studiotorino did on the Boxster especially, with the lowered windscreen very reminiscent of the 550… So, I’ve been waiting to see this project for a long while,” Eric wrote in an email message.

“Sadly, I think it turned out looking nothing like it’s previous coachbuilt Cayman/ Boxster. The styling they went for this time just looks very much like an aftermarket “styling-company” would have done some fugly bumpers and exaggerated tailpipe styling etc.. etc. Not at all to a coachbuilt level of design,” he said.

You can tell us what you think too in the comments box.

By John Halas

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