Skoda Favorit Reworked As Modern EV Hatch By Designers

You may not think about it much, but the little Skoda Favorit – a car that’s all but vanished from the roads of Britain – is one of the most important models the Czech brand ever produced.

Launched in 1987, when Skoda was still owned by the communist government of what was then Czechoslovakia, the little Favorit was the bridging point between the old and new iterations of Skoda. It was the brand’s first front-engined, front-wheel drive car, but was developed before it slowly became an ever-bigger part of Volkswagen throughout the 1990s.

It’s because of this importance that Skoda designer Ljudmil Slavov chose to rework the Favorit as a bang-up-to-date retro-inspired EV. With help from student and fellow design team member David Stingl, he’s rendered it as a modern supermini blending the original’s styling with Skoda’s present-day ‘Modern Solid’ corporate look.

The boxy lines of the (Bertone-styled) original car have been rounded off a little, and it’s bigger overall. The classic Favorit’s blocky head- and tail lights – both off-the-shelf units that were easily mass-producible – have been reinterpreted as friendly-looking, minimalist LED light signatures.

Up front, those slender lights sit above semi-translucent covers through which further light patterns could be projected, say Slavov and Stingl, or could even be folded away entirely to reveal a larger headlamp. Oh, and one thing the original definitely didn’t have was split-opening doors, but that’s something that’s been integrated into Slavov and Stingl’s concept.

Oh, and just in case this wasn’t cool enough, Ljudmil’s also sketched a racing version, inspired by the original Favorit’s exploits in rallying, where it routinely punched above its weight. His concept gets bumpers covered in a grey soft-touch material, a reference to the unpainted plastic items on the original.

Ultimately, this is just a pair of designers’ passion project and something that celebrates a crucial part of Skoda’s history, rather than anything that has a serious chance of production. Then again, other ’80s-inspired electric superminis like the Renault 5 E-Tech and Fiat Grande Panda have been stealing hearts across Europe and beyond – surely there’s room for another?