Abstract: A folding hood for motor vehicles has a hood frame supporting the hood cover and being fordable to an open position in order to stretch the hood cover, and a reinforcement of the stretched hood cover, adjoining a strut supporting the cover, by way of a shaping shell mounted between the strut and the hood cover. Because of its dimensional rigidity, the cover interacts in a shaping manner with the hood cover resting flat thereon. The shaping shell is positioned under the hood cover via a tensile connecting device extending transversely to the strut and stretched tightly when the hood frame is folded open. In order to permit a space-saving storage position of the folding hood even with a larger-sized shaping shell the shaping shell is transversely deformable, in a flexurally resilient manner, about a longitudinal axis extending along its bearing position on the strut. When the folding hood is open, the shaping is retained in a relaxed initial position.