Vespa Scooters

Vespa LX
Three models--ranging from the vintage-lovers' PX with manual gear shift, to the Granturismo, the largest and most powerful Vespa, to the new LX, the latest restyling of the classic Vespa design--offer a practical and fun alternative to traditional transportation, to riders with a variety of needs.

Vespa GT
With over 16 million units produced since 1946, Vespa is one of the world¹s most successful industrial design brands. Renowned for its revolutionary design, commitment to quality, and dynamic spirit, Vespa remains unchanged in the original attributes that made it one of the most important icons of our time, and the new generation of Vespa models is no exception, say Vespa executives.

Buzzing About On A Vespa

Now Piaggio is getting into the act with the release of a retro-inspired Vespa. The new Vespa S, with its rectangular headlamp, trimmed down mudguard and racy-looking back light, is designed to appeal to Italian youths who have heard about the famous 50 Special model from parents or grandparents.

The Vespa 50 special first appeared in 1969 and rapidly became a favorite because it was light, sporty and seemed to represent the freedom of youth. Original models are still highly sought after and the bike’s cult status was confirmed a few years ago when teen band Lunapop sang its praises in their smash hit ‘50 Special’.

The scooter’s modern version comes in 50cc and 125cc versions and will sell respectively for 2,500 and 3,200 euros.

Piaggio introduces retro-like Vespa S scooter

NEW VESPA S SCOOTER

Piaggio has a new scooter model on the market, claiming the Vespa S is a direct descendent of its 50 Special and Primavera.

The idea, apparently, is to appeal to the Italian youth who may have heard tales of those older models from their parents - and indeed the fun they had riding them in the late 60s and early 70s.

Saying that, it does look not unlike a modern Vespa, with the addition of the rectangular headlight, trimmed-down mudguard and sporty rear light. There's a choice of 50cc and 125cc and a variety of colour-schemes, each with its own accessories - with prices at 2,500 Euros for the 50cc and 3,200 for the 125cc.

Find out more at the Official Vespa website (translated from Italian)

For more of the same with a contemporary twist, check out our newly-launched Switched On Set website

NEW VESPA

Piaggio MP3: Two front wheels - a revolutionary concept

Piaggio has come up with another revolutionary product: the PIAGGIO MP3, a totally innovative three-wheeler with two front wheels. The PIAGGIO MP3 provides safety, road grip and stability levels that no two-wheeler can match. Power, performance and ease of use make for a very entertaining ride.

The two front wheels of the PIAGGIO MP3 re-define the very concept of ride stability to provide an unprecedented riding experience.
The front assembly, with two independent tilting wheels, is far more stable than any scooter. The PIAGGIO MP3 grips the road even when tailing other vehicles, providing top performance in total safety.
The full extent of this three-wheeler's stability can be tested on wet asphalt or tough riding conditions that would sorely challenge a traditional two-wheeler.
In town and city traffic the PIAGGIO MP3 has no equal in terms of safety. It takes on cobblestone streets, patchy asphalt and tram tracks with the greatest of ease, remaining safe and stable all the while.

Piaggio Launches New Vespa S

The appeal of the racing “Vespino” lives on in the shape of the all-new Vespa S. The minimalist design of the Vespa S traces its origins to legendary models such as the 50 Special and the Vespa Primavera.

Sport, dynamism and originality are the trademarks of the all-new Vespa S. Clean, essential lines provide a minimalist version of the original Vespa legend.

The reduced handlebar on the Vespa S holds a new rectangular headlamp. It’s not the first time we’re seeing a Vespa headlamp in this shape: Vespa fans will remember its use on the extraordinary 50 Special, a teenage icon in the Fabulous Seventies. The front shell is now bigger and hosts a new air intake that confers an aggressive touch to the frontal.
Downsized to highlight the view of the suspension, the mudguard in a new shape features stylish chrome trim for a sleeker look. Its reduced size also puts the wheel and the light alloy wheel rims on display in a tribute to the Vespa S’s performance and technological content.

vespa story

VESPA STORY

Vespa has not only given its stamp to an entire epoch, it even became the symbol of a Europe struggling to rise from the catastrophe of the Second World War.
Piaggio came out of the conflict with its Pontedera plant completely demolished by bombs.
At the company's helm was Enrico Piaggio, having taken over from his father Rinaldo. Enrico decided to leave the aeronautics field and pay his attention to problems of personal mobility. Italy's broken economy and the disastrous state of the roads did not lend to fast developments in the automobile markets. But hunger for mobility required immediate answers. From an intuition of Enrico Piaggio's, in the spring of 1946 the Vespa was born.
Corradino D'Ascanio undertook to design a simple vehicle, robust and economic but comfortable and elegant, one which could be driven easily by anyone, women too, and which would not dirty the driver's clothes and would permit carrying a passenger.
D'Ascanio, a genial aeronautics engineer, had been with Piaggio since 1934 and was responsible for the project and construction of the first modern helicopter.
D'Ascanio, who could not stand motorbikes, dreamed up a revolutionary vehicle. Dipping into his knowledge of aeronautics, he imagined a vehicle built on a frame and with a handlebar gearchange. He mounted the engine on the rear wheel. The front fork, like an aircraft's landing gear, allowed easy wheel changing.
In April of 1946, the first 15 Vespas left the Pontedera works. The first Vespa had a 98cc two-stroke engine giving 3.5 hp at 4,500 revs. It reached 60 kilometres per hour and had 3 gears.
This was a real two-wheeled utility vehicle. But it did not resemble an uncomfortable and noisy motorbike; it emanated class and elegance at first glance.
Vespa's success was a phenomenon never to be repeated again. By the end of 1949, 35,000 units had been produced. Italy was getting over its war wounds and getting about on Vespas. In ten years, one million were produced. By the mid-fifties, Vespa was being produced in Germany, Great Britain, France, Belgium, Spain and, of course, Italy. And only a few years later, in India and Indonesia too.
The 125 of 1948, the legendary 150 GS of 1955, the 50cc of 1963, 1968's Primavera, the PX, born in 1978 and still today produced in the classic 125, 150 and 200cc versions are just some of the steps that have distinguished the technical and stylistic evolution of the world's most famous two-wheeler.

A STORY OF SUCCSESS

Vespa

A Story of Success

Not many products can look back on a life span of over fifty years - but the Vespa from Piaggio can. This motorcycle, developed in Italy during the post-World War II years, moved from being a utility vehicle, whose characteristics had been dictated by criteria such as function and cost, to international success and is now a "cult object". So what is the story behind this unique motorcycle?

The Vespa was born in the post-war period in Italy. The company Piaggio with its manager Enrico Piaggio suffered from the destruction of several parts of their factories and was forced to adopt their wartime production to the peace that came over Europe. The country was poor, its infrastructure was set back by about thirty years and the level of consumption was low. But Enrico Piaggio had an idea that suited that period. Something that was suitable for the growth of the domestic market, the need for mobility and to recover the industrialization: He invented the Vespa motorscooter. On 23 April 1946 at 12 o'clock in the central office for inventions, models and makes of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce in Florence, Piaggio e C. S.p.A. (Piaggio and Co.) took out a patent for a "motorcycle of a rational complexity of organs and elements combined with a frame with mudguards and a casing covering the whole mechanical part". This was the official birth of the Vespa.

But the name of that scooter was not always Vespa. The first prototype was given the initials MP5 and baptized "Paperino". This is the Italian name for Donald Duck. It was given that name by the workers because of the strange shape it had. But when Enrico Piaggio saw it he did not like the design at all and asked Corradino D'Ascanio to redesign it. So Corradino D'Ascanio, a former aeronautical designer, made a nearly complete redesign. When that prototype, called MP6, was shown to Enrico Piaggio and he heard the buzzing sound of the engine he exclaimed "sembra una vespa" which means "seems like a wasp". And the name Vespa remained.

The MP5 "Paperino"

The MP6 "Vespa"

Especially the redesign by Corradino D'Ascanio made the Vespa something special. Actually, Corradino D'Ascanio did not like motorcycles at all. He found them uncomfortable, the wheels where difficult to change after a puncture and, worse still, the drive chain made them and the driver dirty. However, his experience from aeronautical design made him find solutions to all these problems. To eliminate the drive chain he thought of a motor directly connected to the back wheel. To make tire changing easier he designed not a fork but a construction very similar to the front wheel of an airplane. To make it even simpler to fix a puncture he thought of a wheel rim that can be slit in two parts to ease the exchange of the inner tube. And finally he designed a body that protected the driver against getting dirty and disheveled. Another specialty of the body worth mentioning is the stress-bearing body like it is used in all cars nowadays but which was not very popular right after the war. Also the riding position was designed to let the driver sit comfortably and safely. And to make it even easier to ride the gear lever was put on the handlebar - decades before the spread of ergonomic studies.

The motor directly connected to the back wheel.

The cult of the Vespa started with its success. In 1946 Piaggio put 2,484 scooters on the market. This number increased to 10,535 in the following year, and by 1948 production had reached 19,822. When, in 1950, the first German licensee started production, there were already over 60,000. And just three years later, already not fewer than 171,200 vehicles that had left the plants. In that decade the Times called the Vespa a completely Italian product, not seen since the Roman chariot. But Piaggio also did its best to spread the Vespa. They created an extensive service network all over Europe and the rest of the world. In 1953 there were already over ten thousand Piaggio service points all around the world, including in America and Asia. Enrico Piaggio also watched with great interest the founding of several motorcyclist clubs around the Vespa. In 1951 no less than twenty thousand Vespa enthusiasts showed up at the "Italian Vespa Day", and in 1953 there were already more then fifty thousand Vespa drivers organized in clubs throughout the world. The word Vespa became synonymous with freedom, mobility and the new lifestyle formed after the war. Even the armed forces got interested in the Vespa. The French army, for example, ordered a few special Vespas that were able to carry arms and bazookas and were meant to be parachuted together with the troops.

Poster of the Vespa Club Europa

Today the Vespa has not lost any of its spirit. Piaggio is prospering, and since the beginning of the nineties they have thrown some brand new scooter models on the market. Sadly, the silhouette of the original Vespa is starting to disappear more and more from the roads, replaced by the look of the new scooters. But the idea of the Vespa still lives even in the new models. The idea of mobility for the persons that can not afford cars. The idea of the lifestyle of a young generation.

I'm also the proud owner of a Vespa, a Vespa PX 200 E Grand Sport, which is the fastest and biggest Vespa produced by Piaggio in the moment, with a cubic capacity of 200 ccm and an (official) maximum speed of 105 km/h. I bought it brand new in 1993 and has not given me any reason to complain yet - except that the clutch cable is tearing every few thousand kilometers. But you can live with that Achilles' tendon if you are always carrying the right tools and spare parts. I love my Vespa for giving me mobility and the possibility to differ from the "regular" motorcyclists and do not want to miss out on riding it a single day.

LOVE VESPA

History has made Vespa into more than just a scooter; it has become a modern myth, a fashion statement, a personal expression. Throughout the decades, Vespa has become an interpreter and an expression of the society in which it lives. In some way, in every era, Vespa’s strength has always been its modernity, its ability to absorb changes in society and new trends which it has then re-defined in terms of mobility. Vespa has always been a message, a strong idea, a metaphor for all that. History of Vespa Chapters of history The origins From scepticism to "miracle" 1956: the Vespa crosses the one million mark Records, sports and long distance travel: around the world with the Vespa Vespa, the cinema and the USA Vespa Communication Vespa is a perfect example of an ever-lasting legend in the history of industrial design. A simple mobility product has become one of the most popular and used concepts of today’s society. Vespa's advertising campaigns have marked various eras of our recent history and have always spoken to the public and dealt with topical issues. As times have changed, Vespa manages to reassert itself again and again. Photogallery Browse Further information Vespa Communication: beyond the legend of Tommaso Fanfani. Teacher of Economics at the University of Pisa, President of the Piaggio Foundation. The birth and history of Omar Calabreses's object of desire Professor of semiology and communication at the University of Siena.