The Wilhelm Karmann factory received the VW 1500 Sport Coupe project from Ghia in early 1960. In order to prepare the Ghia prototype for series production, a few optical wrinkles needed to be ironed out. The gracefully curved edge around the rear wheel well disappeared, the turn signal lights were changed, and the rear portion received a face lift. The prototype built by Ghia was built on a Type 14 chassis because VW had not completed the VW 1500 chassis by that time. During the pre-production refinement period from early 1960 through early 1961, Karmann engineers demanded that the prototype be fitted onto the newly designed VW 1500 chassis and be fully tested with this final arrangement.

Development of the Cabriolet model was begun at Karmann during Coupe refinement. As the September 1961 Frankfurt International Auto Show deadline quickly approached, Karmann built at least two Cabriolet prototypes in time for the unveiling. However, continued development of the top design continued after the Frankfurt Show as the dates on two different drawings are in late-November 1961.

There must have been considerable discussion between Karmann & VW regarding the frontal aspects of the T34 since there were several different mock-up designs of the nose in 1960. The sweeping eyebrows over the headlights in the original Ghia prototype were smoothed, modified, and completely redone to see if VW preferred a different look. One of these designs eliminated the fog lights and brought Type 14 styling back with an air intake grill. Another design pulled the fog lights out toward the headlights in a true quad arrangement. Finally they settled on the original eyebrow lines of the Ghia prototype but were undecided where to place the fog lights. In the final stage of development they built two designs and put them side by side for comparison ... and the original Ghia design was chosen for production. The issue of fog light placement was due primarily to restrictive laws in Europe and not simply for cosmetic reasons. By mid-1961 it was agreed that the fog lights should be positioned nearest to the center of the nose, snugly inside the curved nose lines. No pre-production prototypes exist today, and photographs are rare.

The rear fender was also reworked as seen in one Karmann archive photo showing the addition of air louvres under the C-pillar, a change that was not implemented in the final production design. Interestingly, the first wood-buck models by Ghia featured this same louvre design.

There was one feature that even escaped into the original press photos & first sales brochure (printed in early-1961) that was changed in the Frankfurt Auto Show cars ... placement of the rear Karmann Ghia script. In several T34s it is located on the far right vertical panel instead of the eventual placement on the far left vertical panel. There is also no sign of the 1500 script on these early brochure photos.