Chevy Camaro is hard to top

No sooner had the Australian-designed Chevrolet Camaro coupe picked up the World Car Design of the Year award than General Motors took the covers off the soft-top version - but only on the company's Facebook page.

GM is showing only front and rear-end images of the Camaro convertible, which will go into production alongside the two-door hard-top at the company's plant in Canada next year.

The soft-top looks identical to the concept revealed at the 2007 Detroit motor show and, like the coupe, is based on the rear-drive Zeta platform, which underpins the VE Commodore.

But despite being designed and engineered by Holden Design in Australia, neither the coupe nor convertible has been formally approved for release in Australia or New Zealand.

"As with the Camaro coupe, all of the design and engineering work for the production version of the Camaro Convertible was done here by us, but no, at this stage there is no business case for either model in Australia," Holden spokesman Jonathan Rose told website GoAuto.

Chevrolet has sold more than 80,000 examples of the fifth-generation Camaro coupe since it went on sale in the US in April 2009, far exceeding GM's sales and profit forecast for the iconic American muscle-car, which had been out of production since 2002.

The 2007 Camaro Convertible concept shared its exterior dimensions with the Camaro coupe, measuring 4730mm long, 2022mm wide and 1344mm high, but the drop-top's windscreen surround, which featured a bright anodised finish, was changed to accommodate the convertible top.

Both cars will be available in North America with 3.6-litre V6 and 6.2-litre V8 engines.

Holden's Melbourne-based design team beat a strong field of European and Japanese brands to the world design award.

Design director Tony Stolfo said the studio was enormously proud to have played a leading role in the revival of such an iconic vehicle.

"Even in its early stages, we felt the Camaro design was something special, paying true homage to its classic pony car heritage," he said.

"To have the talents of the Holden design team recognised in this way is a great honour and true recognition of the endless hours spent developing and honing the final theme.

"Great credit should also go to our engineers who managed to keep the production vehicle faithful to the original concept and deliver the performance expected of a vehicle representing the Camaro.

"It's yet another demonstration of the unique automotive talent that we have in Australia."

The Camaro outpointed three other finalists - the Toyota Prius, Citroen C3 Picasso and Kia Soul - to claim the 2010 design award.

Volkswagen's Polo hatch beat the Prius, Mercedes-Benz's new E-Class and 27 other World Car of the Year nominees to take the overall top prize.