In many respects, Maranello’s latest creation invites muscular, high-energy adjectives – descriptors that wrap it in a perfectly tailored guise for the marque’s most agile and sharp-tempered production model. Flavio Manzoni, Chief Design Officer, however, offers an alternative reading for this whirlwind of dynamism, one rooted in innovation. “Starting with the 12Cilindri, we decided not only to adopt new visual codes and project them into the future, but also to challenge some of the thought patterns prevalent in design schools. This is surprising, because in automotive language there’s a sense that you must adhere to entrenched conventions of line and proportion. The Testarossa is part of this process”.
Striking and identifiable features
The flavour that emerges is a revisited berlinetta, with geometrically controlled volumes, i.e. built on clean, “Cartesian” lines that shape and direct different parts of the bodywork, in a carefully balanced mix of sharp lines and sensual surfaces. One of the most striking and identifiable features is, of course, the large dark vertical element behind the door: “It serves to resolve one of the car’s key challenges, how to cool what are the biggest radiators in the road range”, explains Carlo Palazzani, Head of Pilot Design Projects. “But it also delivers a very technical and intriguing aesthetic, reminiscent of an aeronautical afterburner, as well as functioning as a formal, flank-supporting “corset”. Defining it required very close collaboration with the Technical Department”.
The aerodynamic
“This expressive interplay of functions – separate yet organically integrated into the bodywork – emerges from a design process that begins at the front of the car and follows a flow that is more than merely visual. The aerodynamics are so crucial that they have generated an authentic channel within the door: a deep recess concealed behind the profile and capable of being engineered from a single piece of aluminium (patented). “After gliding over the front, shaped by the bumper’s architecture and the two flicks that direct it upward, the air is then guided along what are the most refined and complex doors ever fitted on a production Ferrari.”
The car’s rear
Despite such excellence, masterfully concealed behind a top surface that seems to follow only the main lines of the bodywork, the rear remains key for both Cx and downforce. “Here we faced another challenge with the twin wings, assisted by a retractable central spoiler, also patented, capable of “stretching” the profile and significantly improving efficiency. Naturally, the resulting stylistic payoff thrilled us.”
A clean and contemporary nose
“The tail design is inspired by the 512 S and the sports prototypes of the 1970s. Personally, I really loved this touch because it was developed with restraint and control”, says Jason Furtado, Exterior Advanced Lead Designer. “Similarly, the nose, angled downwards, appears powerful because it is reminiscent of the supercars of yesteryear, but its restraint makes it clean and contemporary”.
An iconic name
And the name? “We only found out once the design was complete. It comes from the competitive 500 TR of 1956, not just the famous 1984 version. So we never thought about the side strips from forty years ago”, concludes Manzoni. Philologically, however, a correspondence can be seen between the most recent Testarossas in the treatment of the sides, which for both features particularly successful graphics on the air intake. This time, however, it has been completely reinvented.
(Full article in A&D no. 276)
