The top three finishers of the Formula 1 Pirelli Gran Premio d’Italia 2026 at Monza will lift a 3D printed trophy this Sunday.
Titled FRAGILE, the trophy was created by Italian artistic duo vedovamazzei (Stella Scala and Simeone Crispino) and commissioned by tire manufacturer Pirelli together with the Pirelli HangarBicocca contemporary art museum.
Tire manufacturer Pirelli is title sponsor of the Formula 1 Pirelli Gran Premio d’Italia 2026 at Monza this weekend.
According to Pirelli, the process started conventionally, with drawings and sketches transposed onto paper. From there it moved to a 3D printing process using nylon powder. The printed part was then painted, galvanized and polished until the surface became reflective.
The printing step delivered a geometry whose rendering would be different if produced any other way: an irregular stack of thin-walled vessels, undercut, hollow, and asymmetric.
The finishing part greatly contributes to give this final look to the trophy as vedovamazzei added a metallic “cover” over the polymer part. The final piece looks like a layered composition of household objects, cups and small bowls, stacked into a vertical form.
This is also not Pirelli’s first pass through additive manufacturing on this program. The Italian Grand Prix trophy has been commissioned from a different Italian artist each year since 2021, and the first of them, Alice Ronchi, arrived at her aluminium lightning bolt through digital modelling, a 1:1 3D print, and wax casting in a foundry. AM has been sitting inside this project since the first edition, mostly as an invisible step between sketch and object.
Read more: Lotus launches Theory 1 with 3D printed lattice headrests
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