How One '90s Concept Car Saved Porsche as We Know It

The Porsche Museum is a floating monolith situated on a roundabout in Stuttgart, Germany. (If you're making a post-pandemic travel bucket list and have only seen it during the Super Bowl, go ahead and slot this in.) At night, the Delugan Meissl design could easily pass for the headquarters of a Bond villain. But despite the sprawling structure - which contains the history of an automotive icon that stretches back to the 1930s - the curation is sparse. Only 80 or so vehicles are exhibited at a time.

The typical tourist might gravitate towards the eye-catching liveried race cars from Le Mans, like the red and white Salzburg or a particularly eccentric model known as the "Pink Pig." A Porsche admirer may stick to the classics, from a body of the Type 64, which preceded any official cars, to the original 356s. A true devotee, however, will make a beeline for a concept car that effectively saved the brand from extinction: the laudable 986 concept, more commonly known as the 1993 Porsche Boxster.