The Giorgetto Giugiaro-styled ‘Esprit’ was Colin Chapman's first serious attempt at building a supercar capable of taking on the likes of Porsche and Ferrari and was an early example of Giugiaro's polygonal 'folded paper' designs.

First unveiled as a concept car at the Turin Motor Show in 1972, it would be another four years before customers took delivery of the first cars, however slow initial sales received a considerable publicity boost with the car's underwater exploits in the 1977 James Bond film ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’.

The Turbo version was first seen in the distinctively liveried, 1980s 'Essex Esprit', a special-edition model named for its association with Essex Petroleum, a major sponsor of the Lotus F1 team at the time.

Its engine, known as the ‘Type 910’, retained the 2.2-litre capacity of the naturally aspirated car but utilised a dry-sump arrangement and generated some 210bhp.

1981 saw the debut of Esprit Series 3 and, at that point, the Turbo became a regular productio...