Beyond Supercars The Unveiling of Pagani Utopia
Once upon a time... there was a sports car. A car with superior performance, beauty, and personality, and a price to match.
Today there is... the hypercar, also with ”amped up” superior performance, beauty, and price, yet often lacking that alluring personality which characterized those great cars of the past, almost as if there was a certain resemblance within the category
Beauty, because it is largely subjective, can be readily found, and performance comes with the price, but personality? That is something quite different. We sometimes think “Oh, that man is so handsome,” or “That woman is such a beauty,” but occasionally we admire a person more intensely because of their exceptionally charming personality, even if they lack the physical beauty so easy to appreciate.
When personality takes center stage, everything else -- beauty, agility, strength -- counts little, but why? Because personality comes from within, as an integral and deep part of our being, reflecting mentality, intelligence, culture, charm, secrets, sensitivity, empathy, and all those intangibles that form our character. Neither found nor seen outside us, it is within our core, an intimate part of us that represents the real value of being human.
Of course, automobiles are not human. They are simply machines, but consider the comparison for a just moment, albeit with due differences.
Pagani UTOPIA should not be considered, in my opinion, just a supercar. It would be homogenizing it into a category that has become almost barren and without purpose. Yes, it’s just a car, a sports car, but one that has, as I said before, an attractive, unique personality! I believe it is more generous and correct to place it in its own personal position, one of status above such classifications.
It has superior performance, beauty, and price, but its real value, which makes it unique, lies in its personality, inside its soul.
Let’s try to discover its character, therefore its mentality, its culture, its secrets, its sensitivity, and its strength, starting with a careful look, without prejudice, at how Horacio Pagani imagined and then created the cockpit of this marvel. Perhaps he had to go back in time to find the spirit of that place where machine and man first met, exchanging and assessing expectations of each other.
To establish a good relationship, this encounter had to be sincere, clearly so, as the creator wanted simple, immediate, and intuitive instruments and commands. The data needed by the driver are analog, as analog instruments are interpreted faster than digital. Ergo, commands and switches are almost all very simple, with only one function: “on” or “off.”
The materials are also simple because, recognizable and natural, leather, aluminum, steel, visible screws, and carbon are sophisticated and technological materials. We are on a “machine”, so it is right. Maybe that’s why we find them there, in the right place, maybe that’s also why it seems to me not to see wood, UTOPIA is a mechanical being to the fullest expression. Metals, technological materials, leather or skin for contact with man but, really ... wood? It would certainly not have a functional task, it would only be a “decorative” material!
The “retro” air of the whole is undeniable, but I believe that Pagani’s intention is to bring the car back to its original charm, to the spirit of the old times, when the car was really controlled by the driver. He or she drove it, but also knew it deeply -- knew how its mechanical parts worked, knew its merits and its defects and therefore, could coax the best performance from this machine.
I believe Pagani tried to demonstrate or, even better, to prove what it is to give life to a mechanical object so that it is appreciated and understood on another level.
Just observe, for example, the gear lever group. In everyday cars, but also in sports cars and supercars, the gear can be automatic or manual, but it is always a command that has a small visible portion that allows us to operate it. But, for the rest, it is a mystery, disappearing from sight! In UTOPIA, it is a visible mechanical piece that shows what it is and how it does its job. Looking closely, it is a work of art, a sculpture, not to say a jewel!
This and all the details that can be found on this car, are an exaltation of mechanical beauty as had not been seen for a long time.
Photos: Pagani Media | Words: Jorge Arcuri
