Pininfarina

Pininfarina has been the preferred designer for Ferrari since 1952, as well as for many other manufacturers such as Peugeot, and has always been keen to create bodywork for sweeping sports cars at a relatively affordable price. Founder Gian-Battista Pinin Farina liked to say of his work: ‘Our style is synonymous with sense of proportion, simplicity and harmony in design, so that after a very long time it remains more than a mere memory of beauty.

At the creation of Carrozzeria Pinin Farina in 1930, Gian-Battista's first ambition was to build bespoke bodywork for wealthy customers, as did most of his competitors at the time. However, his most cherished project was already to build small series rather than single vehicles. He believed that a perfect car had to be produced in quantity to recoup the costs of a prototype. His motto was ‘a unique car for multiple customers’... And indeed, Pininfarina was an undisputed frontrunner among Italian and European coachbuilders when it stopped being a fashion house and decided to produce cars on an industrial scale, thanks in particular to partnerships with major manufacturers.

CORNERSTONE OF ITALIAN COACHBUILDING 

The Pininfarina saga began long before the creation of the design company with the ‘Stabilimenti Industriali Giovanni Farina’ founded in 1906 in Turin. Together with his brother Gian-Battista, Giovanni produced bodywork for manufacturers such as De Dion-Bouton, Lancia and Peugeot. Many future design legends were trained here, including Felice Boano, Alfredo Vignale and Pietro Frua. It was on 22 May 1930 that Gian-Battista Pinin Farina joined forces with Giovanni Battista Devalle, Gaspare Bona Pietro Monateri, Arrigo De Angeli and Vincenzo Lancia to establish the ‘Società anonima Carrozzeria Pinin Farina’ at 107 Corso Trapani in Turin.

Before the war, the company's activity was mainly focused on the design and manufacturing of components for Lancia, Alfa Romeo, Fiat, Hispano Suiza and even Rolls-Royce. Although Gian-Battista was an autodidact, he had the intuition that the curved bodywork he loved so much had an influence on the aerodynamics of cars. The Aerodynamica coupé, developed from 1936 onwards on a Lancia Aprilia chassis, was a perfect illustration of this principle. This particular style was adopted for most of the bodywork designed by Pinin Farina before the war. Some of the most striking examples include the Lancia Astura cabriolet and the Fiat 2800 of 1938, and the Alfa Romeo 6C 2500 SS sports cabriolet of 1939.

THE POST-WAR BOOM 

The war put a temporary halt to the company's business, as it was cut off at the peak of its growth. Its Turin premises were requisitioned for the war effort and then destroyed. In 1946, Pinin Farina resumed its industrial route, forming partnerships with manufacturers such as Nash, Dodge and General Motors in the United States. In Europe, his most notable collaborations included Peugeot, with the 403 in 1955, and above all Ferrari, a relationship that continues until this day.

Sergio Pininfarina even succeeded in gradually expanding into small series production, notably with the Alfa Romeo Giulietta Spider, of which 4,000 units were built in 1959. To expand its business, a new factory was built at Grugliasco on the outskirts of Turin in 1957, followed by San Giorgio Canavese in 1986, where the Peugeot 406 coupé was built. Pininfarina's growth was so substantial that in 1986 the company was listed on the Milan stock exchange. The company continued to grow, thanks to a partnership with Mitsubishi in 1999 and the takeover of Matra Automobile Engineering in 2003. By the end of 2015, a number of economic setbacks resulted in the takeover of Pininfarina Spa by Indian carmaker Mahindra.