Fiat Topolino Upgraded By Two Italian Tuning Legends

Fabrizio Giugiaro and Lapo Elkann turn the Fiat Topolino into dramatic Top.L and Top.J concepts, pushing emotional design on a budget city EV.

Fabrizio Giugiaro and Lapo Elkann just proved that even a sub-$15,000 electric city car can carry the weight of a design statement. At Salone Auto Torino, the pair unveiled two one-off versions of the Fiat Topolino, badged Top.L and Top.J, both built at Giugiaro's GFG Style studio.

Neither car changes the Topolino's role as a low-speed urban runabout. What they change is how that role looks and feels, turning Fiat's cheapest EV into a rolling argument that emotion does not require horsepower or a big sticker price.

Source: GFG Style

Top.L strips the Topolino down to a roofless two-seat speedster with a minimal windshield, finished in matte aquamarine with a leather and Alcantara cabin in the same tone. Giugiaro says the goal was pushing a small, accessible car as far as emotion and creativity would allow.

The styling nods to rebellious sports cars like the Porsche 550 Spyder that James Dean nicknamed Little Bastard, not as a literal copy but as an attitude. It is a small car built to be noticed without needing speed to back it up.

Top.J flips that idea entirely. It seats four in a car just 8.3 feet long, with the rear pair sitting facing rearward. A fabric cover replaces the fixed roof, and the cabin mixes foam and leather in blue and green.

That livery references the Ferrari 166 MM owned by Gianni Agnelli, Lapo Elkann's grandfather, and recalls Umberto Agnelli's habit of commissioning cars in those same colors. Elkann says the names split the concept in two: Top.J for joy, Top.L for love, free, irreverent, and authentic.

Source: GFG Style

Strip away the leather and the Agnelli-family color story, and the production Fiat Topolino remains a light quadricycle, not a full car by US or European standards. It is built for short urban hops, not open-road cruising or family duty.

US-spec Topolinos currently ship with a maximum speed of about 19 miles per hour, and they are not street legal out of the box. Fiat plans a free dealer-installed Street Legal Conversion Kit by late summer 2026 that reclassifies the car as a Low Speed Vehicle, raises top speed to about 25 miles per hour, and allows use on most roads posted at 35 miles per hour or less.

European rules add another wrinkle. The Topolino is certified as a two-seat light quadricycle in the L6e class, so Top.J's four-person layout remains a design exercise rather than something buyers could register as-is. Giugiaro and Elkann are treating it as a styling showcase.

Fiat has already leaned on the Topolino's cheap-EV identity elsewhere, from US-focused neighborhoods and golf cart use to persistent Abarth performance rumors. With US cars now listed at about $14,985 before options and a Street Legal Conversion Kit on the way, the picture of what this tiny EV does on both sides of the Atlantic is getting clearer. Giugiaro and Elkann call Top.L and Top.J the start of a longer collaboration, without naming what comes next.

What do you think?

Motor1's Take: The Top.L and Top.J show styling can give low-speed EVs personality without changing their purpose. That will matter to buyers and cities that value cheap, visible transport.

Watch to see whether future projects from this collaboration reach road legality or stay as one-off showpieces. If they remain concepts, the pair still show how far designers can push the look of an inexpensive city EV.