The New Ferrari Styling Centre: Beautifully Designed to Inspire Beautiful Designs

The new Ferrari Styling Centre (Centro Stile) is located in the heart of the Maranello plant and is where the designers trace out the lines of the Ferraris of the future.

The Concept

The plan for the new building was undertaken by the Ferrari Design team under the guidance of Flavio Manzoni, while the architectural design was developed in partnership with Studio Design International in London, led by the architect Davide Padoa, and with the Planning studio in Bologna.

Designers and digital surface modellers work in synergy in light and spacious open spaces while the modelling department also plays a central role: it is here that special milling machines create scale and life-size maquettes, processing the information through CAM applications, before they are finished manually by expert modellers. The upholstery workshop and an area dedicated to colour and trim, enable the assessment of the best aesthetic and tactile results depending on the choice of materials to be used for the exterior and interior.

The benefits of natural light were integral to the design of all the Styling Centre work spaces, in particular for the large presentation room and the large terrace used to view the models being worked on.

Exterior Ferrari Styling Centre

The new Styling Centre also hosts the new Atelier areas and the Tailor Made personalisation programme spaces aimed at creating an even more exclusive relationship with customers.

The new Ateliers are designed to significantly enrich the configuration experience for clients with the help of the dedicated team of experts who support the customer in their choices.

In the new Tailor Made programme area, customers can also count on the advice of a Personal Designer from the design department and an almost unlimited catalogue of materials for the chance to create special, unrivalled specifications for their car.

The Exterior

The structure, which covers an area of 1600 square metres, is a compact volume divided into four levels (one of which is underground) and has an unusually shaped façade that merges the main front with the side that overlooks the adjoining Engine Assembly department. Visitors arriving from the main approach on Viale Enzo Ferrari thus see a very sculptural shape that recalls the dynamic lines of Ferrari’s cars.

Ferrari Styling Centre

The geometry of the building features the intersection of concave and convex surfaces which generate tension and acceleration in the volumes that give lightness and visual elasticity to the whole. Supporting this concept in terms of construction, a ‘double skin’ façade uses a triangular pattern on the outside, alternating over 3000 elements in glass and gilded aluminium. The dimensions of these details vary continuously to create the desired surface dynamism in a perfect harmony of shapes.

This solution serves a dual purpose: one of a ‘filter’ to the outside in order to protect the secrecy of the projects developed within, and the other ‘aesthetic’ in order to be able to move more freely with respect to the geometric layout of the building and create a more plastic volume, giving the building a sculptural value.