Legendary designer Nuccio Bertone (1914-1997) has been inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in Detroit, taking his place alongside other automotive icons, including Henry Ford, Giovanni Agnelli, Louis Renault and the Michelin brothers.

The Hall of Fame citation accompanying the award reads, in part, "For the influence he has had on car design, for having discovered and encouraged some of the world's best designers, for having contributed to the car industry for decades and for having created some of the best cars around, the Automotive Hall of Fame is proud to include Nuccio Bertone among its members." His tremendous impact on the design community has been honored by many other awards, including honorary doctorates from the Art Center College of Design and Turin Polytechnic, and induction into the European Automotive Hall of Fame in Geneva.

The Bertone Group traces its roots back to 1912, when Giovanni Bertone, then aged 28, opened a workshop specialising in the construction and repair of horse-drawn carriages. In 1914 Giuseppe, the second son in the Bertone family, was born. Everyone took to calling him Nuccio, a nickname which stayed with him for the rest of his life, and become synonymous with Italian style throughout the world. After his death in 1997, Nuccio Bertone was described by Fulvio Cinti, motoring journalist and automotive historian, as "one of the greatest coachbuilders of the century, and international Maestro of Italian style." One of the many seminal designs originating from Stile Bertone was the famous Lancia Stratos 0, shown above. Incredibly, the Stratos 0, which Bertone originally named the Stratoline, debuted nearly four decades ago in 1970.

[Source: Bertone via Car Body Design]