Brescia Hommage: A Nostalgic Hypercar Design by Robson Marques de Pontes

Reviving the Essence of Ettore Bugatti's Genius in Modern Automotive Design

The Brescia Hommage is a unique design that draws inspiration from the 1910 Type 13, one of the first road cars to use a 16-valve engine, and the P100 air racer, a precursor of the modern W16 engine concept. It is a critique of the present-day high-tech, low-touch, and iPhone-like vehicles that seem to have lost the "good old school" zeitgeist. The design aims to synthesize these feelings into what could be the last "pur-sang des automobiles".

What sets the Brescia Hommage apart is its celebration of the human capacity to create power and beauty. In an era of eco-friendly box designs and soulless touch screens, this design pays homage to the time when the man-machine relationship had a different meaning. It is a tribute to the genius of Ettore Bugatti, who constructed the first real Bugatti, the Brescia Type 13, in a time when vehicles were more than just a means of transportation.

The Brescia Hommage was realized through a series of steps, starting with a briefing, followed by research, mood board selection, sketching, 3D CAS modelling, virtual reality design development, and finally, the creation of photorealistic presentation imagery. The design envisages a lightweight carbon fibre monocoque and alloys, elegantly dressed in carbon fibre composite outer panels.

Designed as a one-of-a-kind hypercar, the Brescia Hommage boasts impressive dimensions: a wheelbase of 2.75 mm, length of 4.6 mm, width of 2.05 mm, and height of 1.18 mm. It is imagined as the fastest road-worthy machine out there, with brutal acceleration, gripping qualities, and fantastic aerodynamics. It is a machine of emotions, an object to be admired, respected, and, why not, feared.

The Brescia Hommage project began in the early months of 2019 in Wolfsburg, Germany, and took shape in January 2020. The project was completed in about two months. It is a combination of practical experience in the car design industry and a personal perspective of how a century-old heritage of state-of-the-art technology should be praised and remembered. The main challenge was to establish a new yet recognizable design language that respected the cultural past of the mark, looked into today's product branding, and proposed tomorrow's guidelines.

In conclusion, the Brescia Hommage is a celebration of an era where elegant simplicity, high-touch materiality, raw power, pure beauty, and the direct connection between man and machine were the rule of the game. It is a tribute to brave and ingenious men like Ettore Bugatti who created mobile devices that amazed the world. It is a design that reminds us of our capacity as emotional and rational beings to create sheer power dressed in absolute beauty.