AI and Automotive Design: The Ferrari Case as a Model of Human–Machine Co-Creation

Abstract: Contemporary automotive design operates at the confluence of aesthetic culture, artisanal heritage, and technological innovation. The rapid evolution of digital tools and the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) have significantly reconfigured the very notion of industrial creativity, transforming the representational, simulation-based, and decision-making processes that underpin vehicular conception. In this context, design transcends its traditional aesthetic and functional dimensions to emerge as a complex cognitive activity, one that intertwines human intuition with the computational capabilities of intelligent systems.This study investigates how Ferrari—an emblematic brand within Italian design and global automotive culture—integrates AI-driven methodologies into its creative workflow while safeguarding the emotional, artisanal, and identity-defining components that constitute its distinctive design language. The Ferrari Design Center serves as a paradigmatic setting for examining the negotiation between tradition and innovation, specifically between the perceptual sensitivity of the designer and the analytical rigor of algorithmic systems.Through a qualitative analysis of the organizational and methodological structure of the Ferrari Design Center and, prospectively, through a direct interview with Chief Design Officer Flavio Manzoni, the research explores AI not as a substitute for human creativity, but as an instrument of cognitive augmentation. Rather than assessing the autonomous design capabilities of AI, the study seeks to understand how such systems can broaden the perceptual, speculative, and imaginative capacities of designers, thereby enabling the exploration of multidimensional and highly complex design scenarios.Within this framework, AI is conceptualized as a platform for human–machine co-creation, capable of processing extensive aesthetic, ergonomic, and aerodynamic datasets and translating them into formal and linguistic propositions aligned with Ferrari’s identity. The interaction between designer and algorithm becomes a heuristic dialogue in which the machine generates variations, correlations, and emergent patterns that the human agent interprets through cultural, sensory, and emotional criteria. This synergistic dynamic accelerates development processes, enhances decision-making, and fosters greater sustainability, all while preserving the emotional and symbolic qualities intrinsic to the brand.From a theoretical perspective, the paper advances an original methodological framework grounded in the principles of cognitive ergonomics, explainability, and augmented creativity. This framework aims to articulate how human–AI collaboration can be structured, evaluated, and optimized within industrial design practice. It contributes to the international discourse on Human–AI Interaction by offering a human-centered yet technologically progressive interpretation of contemporary creative processes.In conclusion, the study positions the Ferrari case as a distinctive model of AI integration within design practices characterized by strong symbolic, cultural, and aesthetic significance. It argues that when AI is conceived as a cognitive partner rather than an autonomous creative agent, it can support—and meaningfully extend—human intuition and artistic judgment without displacing their primacy. Within this perspective, the human designer remains central, guiding and interpreting algorithmic output through aesthetic sensibility, cultural competence, and emotional intelligence. AI thus emerges as a form of collaborative intelligence, capable of amplifying human design sensibility and enabling an unprecedented synthesis of emotion, function, and technology, in which the artistic dimension continues to originate from human creativity while being reinterpreted and enriched through novel cognitive and technological paradigms.

Keywords: Human–AI Interaction, Cognitive Augmentation, Automotive Design

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1007134

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