The Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra brings sinister Italian flare to Detroit

The Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra design concept rolled into the 2013 North American International Auto Show with a name that hints to the dark design scheme of this great looking high performance compact.

While the 2013 Fiat 500 is a fairly round, bubbly little compact hatchback, the design changes made to the high performance Abarth trimline go a long way in creating an aggressive looking hot hatch – with the new Tenebra design concept taking that look a step further. The word Tenebra is the Italian word for darkness and that dark theme has been applied almost everywhere – inside and out.

Around the outside, the Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra design concept begins with an awesome matte dark gray exterior paint that looks amazing on the Abarth form. Contrasting against the dark matte finish are a great many items finished in gloss black chrome including the head light bezels, the tail light trim, the lightweight 16” Abarth design wheels, the mirror caps and the body side stripe. The Tenebra concept also wears a huge Abarth scorpion logo on the roof that is also gloss black.

Inside, the Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra features special Abarth designed, race inspired front seats that include pass through style race harnesses with these unique seats wrapped in black leather with gray piping and stitch work. The look of black leather with gray stitching is continued on the flat bottomed Abarth sport steering wheel along with the padded instrument cluster brow, on the shifter boot and the parking brake handle. The entire dash is finished in a matte finish carbon fiber that adds an extra element of sporty, upscale design that is something that you would expect out of one of the Abarth’s cousins over at Ferrari. Finally, the interior of the 500 Abarth Tenebra is fitted with the segment exclusive Beats by Dre audio system which is guaranteed to deliver studio grade sound quality. This system includes six full range speakers located around the interior and an 8 inch dual voice subwoofer mounted in the 500’s rear cargo area – with all of these speakers being fed by an 8 channel amplifier equipped with the Beat’s Audio digital sound processing system. In short, the 500 Abarth Tenebra is equipped with the best stock sound system available in any compact in the US market.

While the Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra is listed as a design concept – it should be pointed out that there are really no features of this sinister looking hot hatch that prevents it from becoming a production reality. The matte gray paint has become a popular feature in the sport compact segment so adding this shade would certainly resonate well with the US market while the gloss black wheels and lighting trim are simple additions to the package. The Beats Audio system is already available in the Fiat lineup as an option so it could easily be equipped as part of a premium package for the 500 Abarth while the black leather race inspired seats with race harnesses stand as the only feature that really wouldn’t translate well into production. Those seats could but if the Tenebra ever becomes a production package – we can expect that the harnesses will be the first thing to be removed.

Fancy seatbelts aside, the Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra design concept is definitely one package that I would love to see offered on the high performance Abarth in the near future. Even if only offered as an exterior trimline, the dark matte with gloss black accents look fantastic on the Abarth – improving what is already one of my favorite cars on the market today.

For a closer look at the Fiat 500 Abarth Tenebra Design Concept, click any of the thumbnails above on the right!