The styling of the V8 is of course based on the original DBS designed by William Towns. Towns was a new boy at Aston Martin having only joined the company in 1966 as a seat designer.

The DBS

Towns started designing a four door version of the car (eventually produced as the Series 1 Lagonda V8) which he then shortened to produce the Aston Martin.

The Series 1 Lagonda V8

The final width of the car is a matter for speculation and there is rumour that the car was intended to be narrower and that due to an error in the production of the bodywork jigs, which could not be rectified without considerable expense, the resulting DBS was 6 inches wider than the DB5. Whether the "production error" was exactly that or whether someone forgot to narrow the design when the car was scaled down from the 4 door version one will never know, but the resulting car is an outstanding piece of design having slightly sharper lines than the classic "coke-bottle" lines of the Camaro.

The GM Camaro

Towns openly admitted that he had been influenced by GM and the rear wing of the DBS is Chevrolet Camaro like but one could equally argue that it is similar to the Swiss built Monteverdi 375S Series 1 in both its overall shape and in the case of the DBS in the front grill with 4 headlights.

The Monteverdi 375S Series 1

The shape however is classic and in keeping with the cars of the time and which came first or which influenced which will probably be debated for years to come.

With the V8 engine becoming available, the nose and light configuration of the car was changed to a design that was reminiscent of the DB3S and DB Mark III.