BMW has unveiled its first Alpina concept model after the German auto giant recently acquired the brand.
Revealed at this past weekend’s 2026 Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este, the dramatic Vision BMW Alpina concept shows the design direction it plans for the group’s new luxury brand, which fits between BMW and Rolls-Royce.
Alpina was founded in 1965 by Burkard Bovensiepen and became famous for tuning BMW road and racing cars. The company has produced illustrious high-performance models such as the B10 Bi-Turbo based on the E34 5 Series — the world’s fastest sedan in 1989 with a top speed of more than 288km/h.
BMW acquired the company in January and made it an exclusive standalone marque in the BMW Group.
“Alpina has always represented a very specific idea of performance and refinement — where speed and comfort are complementary ambitions. Our role as the new custodians of this brand is to preserve this distinctiveness and shape it for a contemporary context,” says Adrian van Hooydonk, head of BMW Group Design.
At a sizeable 5.2m in length, the Vision BMW Alpina concept is a bold coupé with a wide, low stance and curvy roofline. The front has a forward-leaning stance that promises speed without overstatement, says BMW, while the shark nose reinterprets BMW’s kidney grille as a three-dimensional sculpture.
A speed feature line rises from the lower front corners at a six-degree inclination and runs along the side of the body and wraps around the rear.
The flanks are adorned by the signature deco-line pinstripes that have characterised Alpina cars since the 1970s, and the 22-inch front and 23-inch rear wheels feature Alpina’s hallmark 20-spokes design.
The rear has elliptical four-pipe exhausts and “Alpina” lettering — reinterpreted as a machined, polished metal element.
Inside, BMW has focused on architectural volumes and each element designed as a standalone form, not absorbed into a homogeneous interior. It includes full-grain leather garnished with deco-lines-inspired stitching, metal components made of watchmaking-inspired beveling, and crystal controls.
Behind the rear console, a glass water bottle sits beside crystal, deco-lines-engraved glasses that rise on a self-deploying mechanism.
BMW’s new Panoramic iDrive, including the passenger screen, spans the width of the dashboard, with a digital user interface crafted for BMW Alpina using heritage blue and green.
BMW hasn’t provided detailed technical specifications of the concept, except to say it is powered by a V8 powertrain tuned to produce rich and deep sounds at low speed and a sonorous note at high revs.
First published in Business Day.
