To the brilliant Marcello Gandini the Laurea Honoris Causa in Mechanical Engineering.

Honorary Degree to Marcello Gandini

The Polytechnic University of Turin has conferred the Laurea Honoris Causa in Mechanical Engineering to Marcello Gandini, a world-renowned car-designer and author of important innovative engineering solutions combining mechanics, technology and style, not only in the field of automotive in his long professional activity. In each of his projects he has applied a strong engineering approach to achieve the best possible result of form, function, research of novel materials, always with a strong tendency to innovation, finding original mechanical solutions for the insertion and arrangement of mechanical components within his creations.

Marcello Gandini è been involved in design from a young age, starting in the field of interior design and then continuing with car design, at first at Bertone, eventually becoming its Style Director and working on models that entered history such as Lamborghini Miura, Ferrari Dino, Lancia Stratos and many others. As an independent designer, he has signed collaborations with many automakers such as Renault, Lamborghini, Maserati, Nissan, Toyota and Subaru, among others. Recently his efforts have been focused on research and innovation, particularly with the aim of reinventing the way a car is produced, obtaining from this continuous research a series of patents and inventions.

Turin Polytechnic’s Magnifico Rector Guido Saracco presented the degree parchment to Marcello Gandini after his Lectio Magistralis, preceded by the laudatio by Professor Massimo Rossetto and the motivation for the award by Professor Giorgio Guglieri, both professors of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering-DIMEAS.

To enrich the setting of the event, fifteen or so historic cars designed by Marcello Gandini for Carrozzeria Bertone, some of them from the collection of the Automotoclub Storico Italiano, were exhibited in the courtyard of the Aula Magna.

“In design work in any context è it is difficult to hold together different aspects and to abandon the established routine – explains the Rector of the Polytechnic of Turin Guido Saracco – The true innovator è però able to see beyond his own discipline, beyond the sheet where he is already throwingù the draft, to unite different needs and even distant knowledge. Marcello Gandini è just that: an innovator in his field, automobile design, but not only. He was able to combine the highest aesthetic taste with cutting-edge engineering and technological solutions, contributing to improving the entire process of industrial design. An extraordinary contribution that the Polytechnic University of Turin has decided to recognize and reward with the title of Mechanical Engineer Honoris Causa”.

“In the course of a long and successful career, Marcello Gandini è was not only a master of Design, but also a man with great capacity for engineering vision – emphasized Professor Massimo Rossetto in his laudatio – A figure of an inventor from another era, who knows how to concretize his thought through design and make his ideas usable to all and sundry. His designs were never limited to appearance but always showed the ability to conceive objects as a whole between mechanics, technology and aesthetics, always seeking innovative solutions”.

“Universally known for his magnificent designs of automobiles that have made many people dream, Marcello Gandini has also and above all worked on’innovation in the field of all-round industrial design – said Professor Giorgio Guglieri, explaining the reasons for conferring the degree – knowing how to give due importance to less obvious aspects of industrial work such as aesthetics and design, developing radically innovative projects and patents regarding all stages of the industrial process: design, construction, choice of materials and assembly of the’automobile and beyond”.

“I am honored to receive this honorary degree – said Marcello Gandini – È the recognition of a path that began when I was 16 years old, when, with the money that had been allotted to me to buy a Latin book, I bought instead a mechanics text, Endothermic Engines by Dante Giacosa. Engineering, applied to car design and engineering, è was my first passion and the common thread throughout my profession”.