1940 328 Mille Miglia Spyder
In the winter of 1939, inside BMW’s design studio in Munich, a small team of draftsmen and engineers worked with quiet urgency. Europe was tense, borders tightening, yet here they were—half-artists, half-scientists—shaping what they believed would be the most advanced sports car of its age. The air was filled with the scent of pencil shavings, machine oil, and the fine dust carved from wooden models. Sheets of vellum hung from drawing boards like suspended sails as designers debated every curve: how air would wrap the fenders, how the bonnet should breathe, and how the tapered tail might release the wind without disturbance.
Internally, BMW already saw this new car as more than a racer.
They envisioned the 328 Mille Miglia Spyder as the evolutionary successor to their famed 328 roadster—an icon that had brought them immense publicity and prestige throughout the 1930s. What they were creating was not just a competition special, but a glimpse at the aerodynamic future BMW hoped to build after the war.
Their guiding principle remained simple: form must follow the wind.
From Munich to Milan
Once finalized, the drawings and wooden bucks were shipped across the Alps. At Carrozzeria Touring of Milan, master craftsmen employed the Superleggera method, stretching thin aluminum over a delicate framework of steel tubes. Hammer blows rang through the workshop as metal was coaxed into impossibly smooth shapes. Where Munich offered discipline and systems, Milan added intuition and artistry. The result was a body that looked as if it had been shaped by the slipstream itself.
The 1940 Mille Miglia
Arriving at Brescia for the 1940 Mille Miglia, the Spyder stopped spectators cold. Long, low, fluid, it seemed almost futuristic compared to its rivals. Its straight-six engine sang through the Italian countryside, its aerodynamic form allowing it to maintain high speeds with an ease that heavier cars could only envy. It was proof that BMW’s vision for a next-generation sports car was grounded not in fantasy but in measurable performance.
After the Mille Miglia, the team headed toward another race in Yugoslavia. On Saturday, they tuned carburetors and inspected the feather-light aluminum skin. But by dawn on Sunday, the world had changed. War had erupted. Borders were sealing. Racing had become irrelevant. The BMW crew packed the Spyder and slipped quietly back toward Germany, carrying with them the final echo of prewar motorsport.
Postwar Echo
Years later, one of these 1940 Spyders resurfaced in England. William Lyons of Jaguar studied it with keen interest—the flowing sides, the endless bonnet line, the purity of form. In his autobiography, Lyons acknowledged that the prewar BMW influenced his thinking as he shaped the postwar Jaguar XK120, helping define the look of British sports cars in the optimistic, rebuilding years.
Legacy
The men who sketched the Spyder in Munich—unaware of the storm about to engulf Europe—could not have imagined its fate. Surviving war, crossing borders, and quietly inspiring designers abroad, the 1940 BMW 328 Mille Miglia Spyder became far more than BMW’s intended successor to the 328 roadster.
Born in Munich, perfected in Milan, raced across a continent, and echoed in England, it became a bridge between eras and a testament to the enduring power of pure, aerodynamic design—beauty that outlived the world that first conceived it.