We at STANCE h
ave had a very eventful term this autumn, and we have a few interesting projects, topics, and events to report. The first we want to talk about is a unique and outstanding opportunity we had this year to employ the services of Italian designer Mr Boris Fabris. In addition to being an extremely nice man, Boris Fabris is a very experienced car
designer- with many production projects to his name. Born in 1972, in Rome Italy, Boris has been working in Turin for nearly 20years and most of those years he has worked at the legendary design studio of Leonardo Fioravanti. One of Bori’s most prominent vehicle designs, was the very first Special Projects Ferrari- the SP1. This unique Ferrari was created
in 2008 for a wealthy Japanese collector.
As you can imagine, the chance to have a Ferrari designer visit us, with deep industry experience to pass onto our students- was a chance we did not want to miss. Mr Fabris offered to hold a one week design workshop, to impart as much of his knowledge and guidance as he could in a visit that proved to be too short (because we enjoyed his company so much). So in September, the Automotive Design Workshop was launched, and students from across our year groups were invited to take part. In total 22 students (the maximum capacity!) were enrolled, and the intense course began on 5th of September with Boris introducing himself to all of our students. After some fascinating insight into the design process, and also some glimpses of his own work, students were all excited and enthused to begin. Boris gave students 2 different design projects within one week. The work was intense and satisfying, with results being demanded so quickly. Boris expertly guided the students to produce ideas and think through the design problems of creating a vehicle as quickly as possible. Enthusiasm
was high, and Boris had even carried his own personal car design library with him (some very heavy books to bring from Turin to Finland!). The history of Italian car design, and also the specific experience of bringing a design from sketch to being stamped out in a factory was something we hoped Boris would bring to us, and he delivered these things superbly. 
Students worked through one brief- for a contemporary luxury coupe- then later in the week Boris used his expertise to place the students into groups
that we knew would simulate a typical design team experience. Those groups set to
work designing a future mega-city urban vehicle design. Group work (once it got underway with the second design brief) was strongly emphasised by Boris, as was team leadership, decision making under pressure and many other real-world, real pressure automotive design industry practises. Our students felt that they gained huge experience in just a matter of days.
The group projects were presented at the end of the week, at the Oy Oy art gallery in Lahti, where we decided to show all of the project work along with other vehicle design artworks by our students (see separate blog post). The two events fitted together nicely, and Boris was happy to publicly show some of his own skills by sketching at the gallery! The intensity of the course and the hard work encouraged by Boris, was only possible thanks to his friendly and warm personality. We will always be grateful to him for visiting, and we would also like to thank the City Council of Lahti for funding of his visit (thanks to our award prize money of 2015).
A gallery of Boris and students at work follows below.
