Good morning everyone, welcome. Thank you.
Before diving into the Ferrari context, since you are an architect, what inspiration have you found this morning, especially as you are the last speaker?
Well, many from Gilda who has shown us beautiful things. Very beautiful also the conversation between Paola and Alberto, so all very stimulating. Then I am a person who has always loved the car since childhood, but has always thought that new ideas cannot be born without contamination between different worlds. Therefore the concept of interdisciplinarity or of, let's say, creative short circuits that are created when connecting different fields is fundamental for me.
Another parallel that came up when we talked last night, Ferrari initially had an external designer which was Pininfarina, right? Then, as is common in furniture, using external design contributions, I was interested if you could tell how culturally the company passed from external design to an internal team.
Well, it's a story that requires some time, but it was something I honestly never imagined. That they called me to create the first style center of Ferrari in 2010 was something that didn't exist in the world. Between you and me, you talked about the artistic and creative partnership with an important coachbuilder like Pininfarina. There wasn't only Pininfarina, there were many coachbuilders working for Ferrari, but at a certain point the company felt the need to bring home the design culture, and that, therefore, also the stylistic identity of the brand was obviously a very difficult job. You can imagine what it means to create from zero a reality that didn't exist with, let's say, company dynamics that were designed to work with an external creative subject, right? So the first years were very hard, based essentially on competition, because I didn't have guaranteed projects, so we were in competition, and in fact the project of the Ferrari that passed before these images was fundamental, that is the Supercar of 2013 that I and my collaborators, who at that time were really, how do I say, the barebones army, we were few and poorly organized, certainly not with adequate structures and facilities, but we managed to win by working day and night for many months, and there we managed to create a relationship of trust with the company that allowed us to continue to do many projects, there were really many, from 2010 to today we are talking about over 70 projects between series cars, track cars which is not obvious because normally track cars are the domain of engineers, so being able to put design also there.
Normally track cars are the domain of engineers, so being able to put design there too.
Yes, starting from the XX version of the Ferrari, the FXXK, we started this relationship with engineers which is wonderful because we discovered that on a track car, an artistic approach can also be applied.
And then the famous one-offs, we saw some pass by. I wanted to show some images that comment visually because it's very important to see the stylistic pluralism from these projects.
The one-offs are an interesting case, they are cars designed in a single example for a single client, obviously very wealthy, and it becomes also a beautiful thing, how to say, it's all research. So also for me my team was fundamental to care for that aspect, because it means also doing cars with totally different technologies, they are much more artisanal objects, so there is the possibility to do things that perhaps remain in the drawer because in production are practically impossible.
They help you do exercises too?
So, I don't consider it binding, I consider it stimulating because, let's not forget that a car is ultimately made of two fundamental components, there is the engineering aspect, there is the beauty aspect. Therefore this combination, how to say, between art and science is exactly what makes the work we do so beautiful, because I couldn't design a car alone, with my team, it wouldn't make sense, right? So understanding from the beginning of a project what are the design characteristics that make that object so different, so thinking what is the right form. There is a beautiful definition by a journalist named Michele Fenu who said 'The car designer's ability should be to give a form to the car that materializes the very essence of the project.' Easy to say, very difficult to do, how to embody the spirit of the project, the identity of the brand and so on. So for me that aspect is fundamental.
How binding is the industrialization, production, and technical aspect of engines today in car design?
Furthermore, there is a story I tell, an anecdote that made me laugh. Yesterday a very good head of marketing left the company, Enrico Gallera. I will never forget a day when we presented a new car, the press, and clearly I and my alter ego, the head of engineering, we talked about the clashes that can happen, then clashes never personal, but dynamic, dynamic, and a journalist said 'But Manzoni, if you could have proceeded alone with this car, how would you have done it, and you Fulgenzi, head of engineering, how would you have done it?' Gallera stops them all and says: 'Ah, certainly neither one nor the other would have sold it.' So, so synthesis, synthesis is the fundamental thing.
So it's synthesis.
And before Paola Navona talked about young people, and from what I read, Ferrari clients are generally much younger than before, and the classic billionaires come from technology or Asia. What is your listening to this growing category of clients? How does it reflect in the design of a car? Or do you not consider it because you are mainly tied to your DNA?
So, it's true that the average age of our clients is reducing, but this is also the result of the approach we have followed in recent years, trying to release cars that are never too, how to say, conservative. This is a bit the difficulty of this job. How to redefine the stylistic codes of a brand thinking about the future? However, rendering them still...
Recognizable, this was probably one of the fundamental levers to conquer much younger clientele, right? But having said that, it's not that we make reason, that is, we don't do clinical tests or market research, no, absolutely. Ferrari works following certain criteria, we consider that the development process of a Ferrari is long, it can take from 3 to 5 years and therefore all the characteristics of that product are discussed several times among us and what we consider fundamental is that, how can I say, this synergy, right? The fact of thinking of the object as something holistic that invests all areas of Ferrari. And therefore we believe that there is also a virtuous circle, right, in designing.
So how does this thought of expansion into the light as a completely different typology or the Purosangue first which was a four-door formula a bit raised come about? How do you live this within your role a bit also as the one who must, so to speak, safeguard and help develop a coherent DNA in design?
