Why Ferrari red is the color every car lover dreams of

Strength, power, confidence. Anger, danger, aggression.

Red is a color that speaks very different languages from different perspectives.

But when it serves as a mouthpiece for voices whose accents differ due to the number of cylinders in its lungs, the tune is harmonious.

Red – rosso corsa, in fact – is the color that every car lover dreams of, and it’s all thanks to Ferrari.

VISIT SBX CARS – View live supercar auctions powered by Supercar Blondie

Red is Ferrari, and Ferrari is red.

The prancing horse has made the rosso corsa hue its own, and through decades of brass branding, advertising, and global sporting success, the blood-colored cars have become part of motoring DNA.

Ever since the first car was built by the legendary manufacturers – the Auto Avio 815 – Ferrari has adopted this signature stamp for its most iconic releases, all the way until the most recent 296 Speciale.

But why that color?

Well, it all stems from Ferrari’s legacy in racing and car culture, dominating on and off track with the brilliant sporty, classy, and bright array of crimson arrows.

Having once been an agent under the Alfa Romeo banner, Ferrari was originally forced into adopting the color for racing.

Back in the 1900s, the FIA (Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile) made race cars use specific colors depending on their nationality.

England sported green, which is synonymous with Aston Martin now, blue for France, silver-grey for Germany, and, you guessed it, Italy had red.

With Enzo Ferrari racing for Alfa Romeo in this hue, he soon adopted it when his own racing team took over from the Fiat-owned company, which continued to supply red race cars for him.

That was until after WWII, when Ferrari became its own manufacturer with a specialist V12 engine and began competing in races.

An iconic 24 Hours of Le Mans victory in 1949 and a win at the 1951 Carrera Panamericana put Ferrari as the people’s champions of racing, all sporting that same crimson autograph.

Alberto Ascari, Manuel Fangio, and Niki Lauda heralded the red race cars over the chequered flag in Formula 1 over the next few decades, as the color became instantly recognizable as the winning stripes.

This spanned into the modern day, too, with Michael Schumacher creating a crimson dynasty.

Soon, everyone associated racing car brilliance with the flash of red. Ferrari had taken the dangerous stigma of the color and overthrown gold as the most regal hue.

But unlike some other brands, Ferrari adopted this company-wide brand kit across all of its automobile branches.

As a result, the first road car produced by Ferrari – the pair of 125 S models – was red, signifying a clear intention to have a popular look on the roads of Italy.

By 1980, though, Ferrari was selling between 2,000 and 2,500 premium cars a year, and 80 percent of these were touted to be that same color.

This has wavered ever so slightly as the Italian marquw has begun moving with the times. Even Enzo’s son has chosen an off-white livery for his own Daytona SP3.

But a reported 40 percent of cars off the assembly line in Maranello are still red, and the new Ferrari F80 was revealed dressed to the nines in a glowing maroon outfit.

At which point, it became the car color of our childhoods.

Nowadays, the association between that color and a leading car is ingrained in our retinas growing up, as the legacy of Ferrari and its branding masterclass has led to a string of icons

From the earliest days of our car memories, the flash of crimson zipping by our eyes is burned into us.

Roary the Racing Car and Lightning McQueen starred on TV and in movies as box-office legends – who didn’t cheer as the ghosts of Doc Brown spurred the garnet-hued racecar over the line to take home the Piston Cup?

Just as Rocky Balboa has us shadowboxing in the bathroom mirror, these cars all gave us a push to collect the keys to a red racecar and take a day off to jet down Route 66 and into the sunset.

Even Hot Wheels’ reported best-selling toy is the ‘Red Baron’.

The same associative techniques are deployed by Ferrari, painting over a third of their cars in this bold hue to give their drivers a flashback to Schumacher and now Hamilton performing donuts in front of the Monza podium.

Now, people are picking up red cars with the insinuation that they are cooler, trendier, and even suspiciously quicker than their road counterparts.

But it’s really the spectral hands of Enzo, Lauda, Schumacher, and more who are painting this continuing legacy, even if it’s on a Toyota RAV4 or a Tesla Model Y.

DISCOVER SBX CARS: The global premium car auction platform powered by Supercar Blondie