OK, most people think the Panache is just a crap copy of a Countach, and in the guise of the Panache LP400, it was just that - although when Paul Lawrenson created it in the early '80s, replica Lambos moulded from actual cars (like the Venom and Primo, as well as Lawrenson's own Prova) were still some years off.
But the original Panache, with its flip-forward canopy access, was actually modelled on a much rarer car - the Japanese Dome P1. I was trawling around the Interweb and found this copy of Kit Car on ebay...
...And here is the Dome P1 for comparison...
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... mezero.jpg
Using a mid-mounted Nissan straight-6, opening windowlettes below the swage line (like the Boomerang concept), coleopter doors and a plush cockpit fitted out with the latest gadgets offered by the Japanese electronics industry, I loved the look of this car ever since seeing pictures of a lime green example in my 1979 Dream Cars book.
Unfortunately the Dome could not be homologated for production in Japan, and plans for export with a revised P2 car came to nothing, although competition Dome cars appeared (unsuccessfully) at Le Mans until the mid-80s.
Its lack of production success told against it when presented to a fickle kit car buying public in 1982. Perhaps if it had been better known, it would not have suffered the ignominy of being modified, piece by painful piece, into a Lambo pastiche, which lacked any of the style that its name implied. Oh well...
Lauren