Stop What You’re Doing And Stare At This 917-Inspired Porsche Carrera GT

Porsche’s Sonderwunsch division, its in-house team that handles special customer orders and restorations (its name literally means ‘Special Request’) has been knocking the projects out lately. We’ve had a ’70s-inspired Cayenne and a Panamera turned into a rolling cigar lounge, both of which are very cool. But this, we think, is indisputably cooler.

It’s a Porsche Carrera GT that’s been brought back to as-new condition by the factory, then treated to a very special livery on behalf of its Puerto Rican owner, Victor Gómez. The Carrera GT, we hope, doesn’t need any introduction, but in case you’ve stumbled across this website by accident, it’s one of the most legendary supercars of all time, revered for its back-to-basics combination of a wailing 5.7-litre, 604bhp V10 engine, six-speed manual gearbox and lithe 1380kg kerbweight.

Gómez’s car, hailing from 2005 and originally painted silver, was apparently showing some signs of age as it passed its 20th birthday, so off it went to Stuttgart for a full disassembly and overhaul. The V10 was rebuilt from the ground up and all the carbon components re-coated, and the result is a CGT that’s described as “in new condition, with zero kilometres on the odometer” by Gómez.

That’s not the biggest change, though. That’d be the red and white livery, inspired by the one worn by the Porsche 917 that won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1970. Known as ‘Salzburg Design’ as the car had been entered by a Porsche dealer in the Austrian city, applying the livery to the Carrera GT was apparently no small feat given its completely different design geometry to the 917.

Many of the details inside and out have been refinished in matt carbon, and swathes of the cabin have been retrimmed in Indian Red Alcantara. In fact, even the car’s fitted luggage set has been recovered with it. Other areas, meanwhile, have been reworked in the FIA-grade black motorsport textile found in the 918 Spyder.

The result, we hope you’ll agree, is a very late contender for the Coolest Thing We’ve Seen All Year award. And now we’re daydreaming about what we could get Sonderwunsch to do with a ratty £5k 924.