The Lagonda Rapide Zagato was a concept coupe presented by Zagato, shown as a 1:1 scale maquette at the Geneva Motor Show a year after Zagato had unveiled the Aston Martin Volante Zagato. It was based on the Aston Martin Lagonda chassis and was conceived as a two-door, four-seat luxury coupe rather than the four-door saloon format of the production Lagonda. To achieve its coupe proportions, the wheelbase of the Aston Martin Lagonda was shortened by 21.5 cm to 270 cm, and a cabriolet version was also planned. Overall dimensions were given as 510 cm in length, 189 cm in width and 141 cm in height.
The car was intended to use the Aston Martin Lagonda's V8 engine, a 5341 cc DOHC unit producing 309 PS. Stylistically, the maquette carried echoes of earlier Lagonda luxury cars, but it was regarded as considerably less convincing than Zagato's recent Aston Martin derivatives, the Vantage Zagato coupe and Volante Zagato convertible, which had been built in 50 and 25 examples respectively and had quickly gained strong collector interest. The Lagonda Rapide Zagato did not progress beyond the maquette stage and was never put into production.
Zagato had a long-standing relationship with Aston Martin, and the name Rapide itself referred back to an earlier Lagonda model, a four-door sports saloon built in only 55 examples between 1961 and 1963 that used Aston Martin mechanicals. From the mid-1970s, Lagonda saloons had continued to be built, but only as models carrying the Aston Martin marque.
