Special Projects

Pininfarina has always had a natural vocation for custom-built motor cars. It was thanks to our exceptional capacity to interpret our clients’ dreams, creating unique or limited series, that the fame of Carrozzeria Pinin Farina spread rapidly in Italy and abroad throughout the 1930s and 40s. Over time Pininfarina’s success led to the move from an artisan to an industrial dimension, as we formed valuable collaboration relationships with the world’s most important car makers. But the company’s ability to make “one-offs” for individual clients has always remained.
During our long history we have continued to develop special projects more or less regularly, constructing cars worthy of legend, but two years ago we resumed the continuous creation of custom-built cars. From our participation at international exhibitions and Concours d’Elegances with our show-cars and prototypes we had noted a strong interest in this kind of vehicle. With a recognised capacity to develop such projects and a long tradition in the motoring world, the idea of pursuing this opportunity further in a structured way proved very appealing in terms of our image and experience.
And so in 2006 we decided to meet the requests of two important collectors. The first was Peter Kalikow, who asked us to design, engineer and build a special version of the Ferrari 612 Scaglietti that would accentuate the car’s lines, developing them along a stylistic path directed towards extreme elegance and exclusivity. The initial brief was clear and simple: a vehicle with a completely new body, but one which diverged from the original in such a subtle and oblique way that only 10% of Ferrari connoisseurs would be able to discern the differences at first glance. The brief was developed and refined to construct a car made to meet the exclusive requirements of the client. He personally followed the stylistic development closely, choosing the make-up of the final product and helping select materials and colours.
Jim Glickenhaus in his turn asked us to create a unique car, based on the Ferrari Enzo and inspired by sport racing cars pushed to the extreme; not a simple showcar, but a vehicle that could be driven on the roads. So was born the Ferrari P4/5 by Pininfarina, a car completely designed, engineered and constructed in our Cambiano factory and aerodynamically tested in our Grugliasco wind tunnel. After determining the final style through a series of refinements on initial sketches, the surfaces were finalised by CAS modelling. We then moved on to the manufacture and actual assembly. More than 200 components were developed specifically through a constant interaction between styling and design: from the Bi-Xenon lights specially created with an innovative system of yellow and white LEDs to the 20-inch aluminium alloy wheels milled from the block to the decorative hinges in aluminium or special steel.
The body – made entirely of carbon fibre – expressed the flowing lines of the car, marked by a soft muscularity. The tapering silhouette of the nose highlights both aerodynamic functionality and aesthetic innovation. The central body is dominated by the single-shell windscreen, while the interior is accessed through two gull-wing doors. The rear features powerful sides with an embedded teardrop-type transparent rear window which also serves as an engine cover. From it emerge the white-ceramic-coated exhausts, recalling a 1960s racing car. At its international premiere at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, the car was the tangible proof of the transformation into reality of what just a few months before had been only Jim’s dream.
Along the journey that brought this extraordinary model to life, a symbiosis grew up between the client and Pininfarina. This is a distinctive characteristic of our service because the client is the project’s real protagonist, intervening in all the phases that lead to the creation of the final custom-built car: from design to engineering, from the selection of materials to the final assembly. In short we are witnessing a real return to the made-to-measure motor car.
I believe that this is what has brought other eminent collectors to us in recent months, asking us to make them their own custom-built car.
The fact that these clients are not just asking for custom-built cars with the Ferrari brand –Pininfarina has been making standard Ferraris for over 55 years – shows that it is truly the personalised service, above all in the design process, that they seek from a company like Pininfarina.
This adventure into the world of custom building is destined to continue, as it is not just in line with our brand positioning, but also allows us to experiment which solutions and innovations we can then apply to our industrial work.