Ferrari Designer Donato Coco joins Lotus as Director of Design
Former Ferrari designer Donato Coco is to join Lotus as Director of Design alongside his former Ferrari colleague Dany Bahar who is now Lotus CEO.
As we’ve reported umpteen times this year, Lotus are getting things very right. They’re selling the new Lotus Evora hand over fist and have plans in place to a convertible Evora and of course the new Lotus Esprit.
Part of the long-term plan at Lotus is to bring the Hethel boys back to the top of the heap in the way Lotus were in the glory days of Colin Chapman. Part of that brief is to bring on board the best talent they can get, a notable recent addition being former Ferrari man Dany Bahar who has joined Lotus as CEO.
Now comes the news that Ferrari designer Donato Coco has upped sticks from Maranello to move to rural Norfolk to turn his talents to designing for Lotus as Director of Design. Donato has been involved in the design of cars like the 458 Italia and F430 for Ferrari and, in his previous job for Citroen, with the C1, C2, C3, Xsara…
All of which augers very well for Lotus cars to come. The Evora convertible is probably a done deal already in terms of design and form, but the new Esprit will probably benefit from a bit of Ferrari-inspired input. Then we have the enticing prospect of a new Elise at some point being designed from scratch with the aid of input from a Ferrari designer and marketed by a former Ferrari head of sales.
All sounds good, as long as the prices don’t get too Ferrari-like on the way.
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