This is a rare, original Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS from 1968. It’s an oft-forgotten rear-engined sports car with beautiful styling by Swiss-born designer Dany Brawand.
The Moretti Sportiva SS was based on the mechanical underpinnings of the Fiat 850 Coupe, which was clothed in all-new bodywork that has been winning the car new fans for decades since it first debuted back in 1965.
Fast Facts: The Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS
- The Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS is a rare coachbuilt Italian sports car produced between 1967 and 1971 by the Moretti Motor Company of Turin. Styled by Swiss designer Dany Brawand, it used Fiat 850 Coupe underpinnings clothed in elegant bodywork that drew visual comparisons to the far more expensive Fiat Dino Spider.
- The Sportiva was built on the Fiat 850’s rear-engine, rear-wheel-drive platform, initially powered by an 843cc inline-four producing 47 bhp. Later versions received a 982cc engine with 61 bhp, and Giannini-tuned units offering up to 70 bhp were available as a factory option. Curb weight was just 1,500 lbs.
- This specific 1968 example was first registered in Sweden and has been in its current owner’s hands for 11 years. It now runs a replacement 903cc engine producing 75 bhp, rebuilt in 2017/2018, though the original numbers-matching 843cc unit is included in the sale for anyone wishing to restore factory-correct specification.
- The car was cosmetically restored in the mid-1990s, repainted from its original light blue to orange-red, with the cabin re-trimmed in burgundy vinyl and fabric. The seller notes minor cosmetic imperfections and a few non-functioning ancillaries, but they note that the car has had consistent mechanical maintenance including annual oil changes throughout their ownership.
History Speedrun: The Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS
The Fiat Moretti Sportiva is one of the most beautiful of the unusual low-production volume Italian sports cars of the 1960s. Built by the Moretti Motor Company of Turin between 1967 and 1971, it used the humble mechanical underpinnings of the Fiat 850 Coupe in a beautifully proportioned body that drew comparisons to the Pininfarina-designed Fiat Dino Spider – a car that cost several times more.
This is a rare, original Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS from 1968. It’s an oft-forgotten air-cooled, rear-engined sports car with beautiful styling by Swiss-born designer Dany Brawand.
The “SS” designation is applied to the model in some period documentation, it typically stood for “Super Sport,” though the car is most commonly referred to simply as the Sportiva. We’re using the SS designation here, as it’s used in the listing of the specific car we’re writing about.
Production numbers of the Sportiva are hotly disputed, the most widely cited figure is approximately 300 examples across all variants, though Giovanni Moretti himself reportedly stated that only around 40 were built, and one Italian registry gives a significantly higher total still.
The Moretti Motor Company
Giovanni Moretti founded the Moretti Motor Company in Turin, Italy in 1925. It started out as a motorcycle manufacturer and found early success, eventually branching into microcars using its existing motorcycle engines in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
During World War II, the company pivoted to producing electric trucks and cars – vehicles that sidestepped the strict fuel rationing of the era and sold well as a result. They had limited range given the battery technology available at the time, however they were perfect for urban use and could be charged overnight.
After the war, Moretti transitioned the company into conventional car production, building small, bespoke sports cars powered by in-house developed engines. They were beautifully built machines by any measure, but designing and manufacturing an entire car from the ground up in small volumes proved economically unsustainable.
The company’s survival came down to a personal friendship between Giovanni Moretti and Gianni Agnelli, the head of Fiat. The two men struck a deal that gave Moretti access to Fiat chassis, running gear, and drivetrains on highly favorable terms.
The 1968 Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS shown here was first registered in Sweden on the 29th of May in 1968, and it’s been in its current owner’s possession for 11 years. The odometer shows just 54,323 kilometers, which the seller believes to be the genuine total from new.
Agnelli was no fool – the arrangement cost him nothing and resulted in a series of attractive, Fiat-badged sports cars that significantly boosted the brand’s image. He essentially got a series of Fiat-branded halo cars for nothing.
By the early 1960s, Moretti had become a specialist coachbuilder of bespoke Fiat-based automobiles, building cars like the well-regarded Moretti 2500 SS Coupe.
Moretti Sportiva SS: Design + Development
Work on the Sportiva SS began in 1964, and the car was first shown publicly at the Turin Motor Show in 1965, though full production didn’t kick off until 1967. The design was the work of Swiss-born stylist Dany Brawand, who had trained under Giovanni Michelotti at Ghia-Aigle beginning in 1952 and followed Michelotti to his own studio in 1959.
By the mid-1960s, Brawand had moved to Moretti full time as head of the company’s styling center, a position he would hold for the next 24 years.
Brawand’s design for the Sportiva was strikingly modern and elegant – low, sinuous, and visually appealing. Despite looking like a much larger car, it stood just 41 inches tall on an 80 inch wheelbase. The styling drew from the same well of inspiration as Pininfarina’s Fiat Dino Spider, namely Aldo Brovarone and Leonardo Fioravanti’s 1965 Dino 206 Berlinetta Speciale show car.
It’s widely claimed that Brawand completed the Sportiva’s design some nine months before Pininfarina unveiled the Dino Spider at the 1966 Turin show, though this timeline has never been verified and likely owes something to the considerable cross-pollination among Turin’s design houses during the period.
This car is powered by a replacement 903cc inline-four producing 75 bhp, driving the rear wheels through a 4-speed manual transmission. The engine was rebuilt with new parts in 2017/2018 and subsequently fine-tuned on a rolling road. The car’s original 843cc engine is included in the sale, offering the next owner the option of returning it to factory-correct specification if so desired.
What is clear is that the Sportiva was not a derivative of the Dino, it was a parallel evolution of similar design language, executed under much, much tighter dimensional constraints.
The original Sportiva SS was offered as a two-seat coupe. The spare wheel had to be mounted horizontally in the front luggage area, taking up the entire front trunk space and thus requiring a cloth luggage compartment between the seats and the engine bay.
A four-seat variant, the S4, was later introduced to address customer complaints about the lack of rear seating, though the resulting design was taller and less graceful than the original. A two-seat convertible, known as the Trasformabile, was also produced in very limited numbers.
Moretti Sportiva SS: Specifications
The Sportiva was built on the Fiat 850’s rear-engine, rear-wheel-drive platform. The initial engine was the higher-output version of the 843cc inline-four as used in the 850 Coupe, producing 47 bhp at 6,000 rpm versus the 34 bhp of the base 850 Berlina, driving the rear wheels through a 4-speed manual transmission. The suspension was independent front and rear, and braking was handled by four-wheel drums.
Later versions of the car received the larger 982cc engine producing 61 bhp, along with front disc brakes – upgrades that brought a decent improvement in both performance and stopping power.
Giannini-tuned engines producing up to 70 bhp were also available as a factory option, and a 982cc variant known as the 1000SC offered 62 bhp. At a curb weight of just 1,500 lbs, the Sportiva was light enough to make the most of even its most modest engine option, delivering excellent performance by the standards of its displacement class.
The Sportiva was built on the Fiat 850’s rear-engine, rear-wheel-drive platform. The initial engine was the higher-output version of the 843cc inline-four as used in the 850 Coupe, producing 47 bhp at 6,000 rpm versus the 34 bhp of the base 850 Berlina, driving the rear wheels through a 4-speed manual transmission.
The base price in 1967 was 1,095,000 lire, rising to nearly two million lire with personalization — notably more expensive than the Fiat 124, which listed at 1,035,000 lire in the same year. A number of owners have since upgraded their Sportivas with larger-displacement Fiat or Abarth-tuned engines for significantly improved performance.
The Sportiva SS sat in a somewhat unusual niche. It wasn’t a tuner car like those offered by Abarth or Giannini, the two dominant names in Fiat-based performance during the 1960s – though, as noted, Giannini engines were available in the Sportiva itself.
The Sportiva’s real competition though was arguably not mechanical at all, but aesthetic. It was a car for buyers who wanted something unusual, handmade, and visually stunning – a bespoke Italian coupe that cost an order of magnitude less than a Ferrari or Lamborghini, but that could still be parked next to them and not look a whisker out of place.
The 1968 Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS Shown Here
The 1968 Fiat Moretti Sportiva SS shown here was first registered in Sweden on the 29th of May in 1968, and it’s been in its current owner’s possession for 11 years. The odometer shows just 54,323 kilometers, which the seller believes to be the genuine total from new.
Power comes from a replacement 903cc inline-four producing 75 bhp, driving the rear wheels through a 4-speed manual transmission. The engine was rebuilt with new parts in 2017/2018 and subsequently fine-tuned on a rolling road. The car’s original 843cc engine is included in the sale, offering the next owner the option of returning it to factory-correct specification if so desired.
The car was restored in the mid-1990s, during which it was repainted from its original light blue, to its current orange-red finish. The cabin was re-trimmed at the same time in burgundy vinyl and fabric, covering the seats and upper dashboard. It rides on 13 inch multi-spoke alloy wheels shod with period-correct Pirelli Cinturato P4 tires.
The seller notes a handful of issues with the car, including a small scratch on the front-left wing, a minor paint bubble on the front luggage lid, a non-functioning horn, a non-working temperature gauge, and a plastic passenger-side window in place of glass.
The car was restored in the mid-1990s, during which it was repainted from its original light blue, to its current orange-red finish. The cabin was re-trimmed at the same time in burgundy vinyl and fabric, covering the seats and upper dashboard. It rides on 13 inch multi-spoke alloy wheels shod with period-correct Pirelli Cinturato P4 tires.
Mechanically, the car has received annual oil changes, a new generator fitted in June of 2025, and new front brake discs, pads, calipers, and hubs installed alongside the engine rebuild. The car uses a centrifugal oil filter behind the crankshaft pulley rather than a conventional replaceable cartridge.
The car is now being offered for sale out of Skurup, Sweden on Collecting Cars, and you can visit the listing here if you’d like to read more or register to bid.
Images courtesy of Collecting Cars
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