Sometimes it takes a personal initiative to get history moving. In this case from Antonio Cobo, the former Managing Director of Opel Spain and Vice President Manufacturing. His heart’s desire: to bring Opel history to Zaragoza – to where the Corsa has been rolling off the assembly line millions of times for decades. Support came from the Head of Opel Classic Leif Rohwedder, who accompanied the vehicle delivery and was personally on site for the opening.

‘Opel Love’ impressed as a clearly structured, chronological journey through more than 160 years of company history. 25 carefully selected objects and automobiles connected the past, present and future of mobility. The venue was Mobility City in Zaragoza – spectacularly located on the bridge over the Ebro River designed by Zaha Hadid, an architectural landmark of the city.

The tour began with a sewing machine from 1870. It demonstrated the industrial origins of the brand. From there, the path led to the Patent Motorwagen Lutzmann of 1899, with which Opel entered automotive history. Single-cylinder, two gears, top speed of 20 km/h – modest from today’s perspective, the down of a new age at the time.

Since the beginning, the Opel brand has stood for the democratisation of technology. Vehicles such as the 4/8 hp ‘Doktorwagen’ or the 4/12 hp ‘Laubfrosch’ made individual mobility affordable and paved the way for large-scale industrial production in Germany. This idea of making innovation accessible was a common thread of the exhibition. At the same time, ‘Opel Love’ looked ahead: from the electric GT of the 1970s to the GT X Experimental to the Manta GSE ElektroMOD, which confidently combines tradition and electric mobility. 



And of course, the Corsa itself could not be missing in Zaragoza. It has been rolling off the production line here since 1982 – and with more than 14 million units across six generations sold, it is inextricably linked to Aragón. From the clearly designed Corsa A to variants such as the Corsa Spider and the Corsa B ‘Moon’ concept, the exhibition showed the versatility of this successful model.

At the same time, the small car bestseller conquers new dimensions. The Opel Corsa GSE Vision Gran Turismo on display shows how far the Corsa idea can be imagined: 800 hp, fully electric, designed for performance. But it doesn’t stop there. Based on the current generation Corsa, Opel recently announed that the Corsa GSE will be coming soon. This also continues the Corsa story from Zaragoza: Since 1982, generation after generation of a small car closely linked to mobility for millions of people has been built here– a model that reinvents itself again and again.