In terms of raw impact, we’re not sure that anything has matched Ford’s debut of the new GT at the 2015 Detroit Auto Show. The thing literally stole the show away from virtually every other car maker. From the dramatic looks to the announcement that it would carry a turbocharged V6 engine instead of a V8 to the further announcement that Ford would be campaigning the GT at LeMans, the world kind of freaked out when that news torrent happened. The interesting thing is that as enthusiasts, we get to see the finished product (or as close to one as they are willing to reveal at an auto show) and we get to see very little of the creation process. After all, this started when someone with some horsepower at the company said (in a meeting), “Hey, we need to revive the GT and race it at LeMans.” That simple statement or some version of it then set the wheels in motion for an industrial colossus like Ford to get the plans in place and do all of the million other things to make the car a reality.
Interestingly, Ford has recently released a video walk through of their secret design studio. This is literally the creative incubator that produced the shapes and look of the car as you see it today. You will see multiple full sized models, drawings everywhere, people working on detail items like the shape and size of the steering wheel, and even a guy working on a clay model. While computer modeling and other factors have modernized the process for today’s designers, the process of turning 2-d concepts into 3-d reality is still markedly the same. The use of models, full sized clay one or small desktop ones is still in practice, large open rooms where multiple members of the design team work on different elements of the car at once or debate over the same things are still present, and most importantly the human mind and eye are still at the center of creating something striking, stunning, and beautiful like the new Ford GT.
This is not some long drawn out video, it is a literal walk through of the design lab like you’d dream to do yourself. The tour takes you all through the work area and there is plenty of cool stuff to see.
Lastly, there is an awesome aura and mystique around “skunkworks” projects like this in American automotive history. The Corvette Stingray was designed in secret, actually hidden off the books at GM and numerous striking cars and machines have been created under a veil of silence by those involved in the project to keep themselves out of the limelight and sometimes off the corporate radar. Hopefully in 10 years someone from the team writes a book about this car coming to life as it has. We’d be first in line for a copy.
