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Miguel Angel Galluzzi

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Miguel Angel Galluzzi
Born (1959-10-26) October 26, 1959 (age 65)
Buenos Aires
Alma materArt Center College of Design
OccupationMotorcycle designer
EmployerPiaggio Group
Notable workDucati Monster

Aprilia Dorsoduro
Moto Guzzi V7 Racer

Moto Guzzi California 1400
TitleVice President of Design
Piaggio Advanced Design Center

The current state of motorcycle design:
It's clear that we are at the end of an era—think for a moment, all the other times that motorcycles suffered a radical transformation were after big wars. Only then, motorcycles changed and moved forward. Motorcycles were intended to be simple machines, not a crazy bunch of electronic devices to control something that nobody really needs. So, we are heading in a direction in which the motorcycle is going to be revolutionized. [1]
— Miguel Galluzzi

On Design:
In my opinion a great designer is about 99% sweat and 1% talent! This means that a lot of discipline is required, even when you feel like you've hit the wall or reached the limit.[2]
— Miguel Galluzzi (2011)

Ducati Monster M900
Cagiva Planet
Aprilia Dorsoduro
Aprilia Mana
Aprilia Shiver
Moto Guzzi V12 X

Miguel Galluzzi (born October 26, 1959) is an industrial designer specializing in motorcycle design. Galluzzi currently heads Piaggio's Advanced Design Center (PADC) in Pasadena, California,[3] where he manages the design of the Aprilia, Moto Guzzi, Derbi and Gilera motorcycle brands, working closely with the company's styling headquarters (Piaggio Group Style Center)[4] in Italy as well as its research and development centers in China, India and Vietnam.[5]

Widely known for having designed the Ducati Monster,[6][7][8] Galluzzi has also designed the Aprilia Dorsoduro, RSV4, and Tuono — as well as the Moto Guzzi V7 Racer[9] and California 1400.[3]

Under Galluzzi's direction, Moto Guzzi received the Motorcycle Design Association Award in 2012,[10] and in 2013, Visor Down named Galuzzi one of its Top Ten motorcycle designers.[11]

Background

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Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina and raised in the US,[4] Galluzzi is a third generation motorcyclist.[11][12] His interest in motorcycling began in the early 1960s when he received a motorcycle as a birthday gift from his uncle,[13] a 1959 Kreidler 50cc.

Galluzzi would later study at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, graduating in 1986[14] from the same Transportation Design program as BMW's noted designer, David Robb.[15] Galluzzi first worked for Opel,[12] and then for Honda's V-Car/Omega design studio in 1988, first in Offenbach, Germany and later in Milan.[12][14][16]

Design career

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In 1989 Galluzzi began designing for Cagiva, then Ducati's parent company, in Varese, Italy.[12][14][16] Staying at Cagiva for 17 years, Galuzzi became Styling Director at Aprilia in July 2006,[17][18] eventually become Vice President of Design for Piaggio, Aprilia's parent company.[14]

In 2012, Galluzzi relocated from Piaggio's headquarters in Pisa to Pasadena, California to lead the company's new Advanced Design Center (PADC),[19][20] which manages other Piaggio centers in China, India, Italy and Vietnam — and works with the main Piaggio Group Style Center, run by Director Marco Lambri.[19] Galluzzi chose the Pasadena location, "because of its proximity to centers of transportation thought," namely the Art Center College of Design, California Institute of Technology, and Jet Propulsion Laboratory.[19]

Galluzzi said he is, "looking for the next form of mobility," five to fifteen years into the future, and he will be, "hiring young and creative and crazy people," at the new design center to do, "experiments that might offer a rethinking or a melding of recent mobility concepts".[19] Piaggio and Galluzzi hope to bring a more cosmopolitan perspective than is possible working only in Italy, and branch out to such areas as electric vehicles that combine aspects of a motorcycle and a car, like the Renault Twizy and Audi Urban Concept.[19][20] The Daily Telegraph's Kevin Ash said, with the Piaggo Group's total US sales, including Aprilia and Vespa, at only 10,000 units in 2011, the new center must also be aimed to bolster sales in that market.[21]

Motorcycle designs

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At Cagiva and working for the Ducati brand, Galluzzi designed the 900 Supersport.[18] The 1991 900 Supersport, offered in full- and half-fairing versions, became a classic, finding a balance between honoring the tradition set by the Super Sport models of the 1970s while looking modern and fresh.[22][23]

Because Galluzzi is 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m) tall, many of his best known creations — which feature low seat heights and high foot pegs (e.g., the Monster) — are better suited to their target buyer than their designer.[24]

Monster

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Main article: Ducati Monster

Under direction of Ducati's technical engineer, Massimo Bordi,[25] Galluzzi created a design widely noted for its rigorous minimalism,[16] — drawing from his realization that "all you need (for a motorcycle) is a saddle, tank, engine, two wheels and handlebars".[14][26] In ranking the Monster as 9th on his list of the 10 best motorcycle designs of all time, noted motorcycle designer, Glynn Kerr, described the design as having "all it needs and no more."[27]

For its 1998 exhibition, The Art of the Motorcycle, the New York Guggenheim Museum featured 114 motorcycles, including the Monster. In the exhibition catalog, the museum said: "flying in the face of every contemporary motorcycle design rubric from Tokyo to Munich, Galluzzi recreated stripped-bare suburban specials in a production motorcycle. The result, a brilliant piece of pop-culture interpretation, was the M900, nicknamed "the Monster."[28]

Numerous sources credit the Monster[6][7][8] with popularizing the naked bike niche." With Monsters sales eventually accounting for two-thirds or more of Ducati's output,[29][30] the bike "became the company's best selling and most profitable model line," essential to the company's success.[12][29]

Later motorcycles

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After the Monster, Galluzzi designed the 1997 Ducati ST2,[31] which Industrial designer Andrew Serbinski considered ill-proportioned in its first generation, with its large fuel tank."[32]

Galluzzi subsequently designed the Cagiva Planet[33] of 1998, a variant of the Mito,[12] followed by the 1999 Raptor and V-Raptor,[12][34] which used a Suzuki engine shared by the TL1000.[35]

After leaving Cagiva and joining Aprilia in 2006, Galluzzi designed the 2007 Aprilia Dorsoduro, 2008 RSV4, 2008 Mana, SL 750 Shiver of 2009,[36] and several Husqvarna models.[12] He also contributed to the Vespa/Piaggio 1+1 concept vehicle.[37]

Many of the Ducatis Galluzzi originally styled were later revised and updated by Pierre Terblanche, including the ST series and the Monster 696 update of 2008. Terblanche later joined Galluzzi at Aprilia, where they have worked together on several new and revised models for Aprilia subsidiary Moto Guzzi. The two collaborated on the Moto Guzzi V12 series, with Le Mans, Strada, and X variants, displayed at EICMA in 2009.[38] Galluzzi described the challenge he and Terblanche faced revising the Moto Guzzi image by saying, "The Guzzi crowd is extremely conservative, but if we only concentrate on those, we are going to lose eventually. So these bikes are looking into the future." This is similar to the balance sought with earlier Ducati designs, but, "the advantage Guzzi has versus Ducati is that Ducati makes sportsbikes, Guzzi can do anything it wants because they've been doing it a long time and on all sorts of bikes."[39]

In 2012 Moto Guzzi introduced Galuzzi's "Art Nouveau style" California 1400 which breaks with traditional Harley-Davidsion-inspired cruiser style of the previous California. The new 1400 is more radically modern, similar to the latest power cruisers, the Harley-Davidsion V-Rod and Ducati Diavel.[21] The bike's new1,400 cc (85 cu in) engine expands Moto Guzzi's engine range, on top of the previous 1,200 cc (73 cu in) and 750 cc (46 cu in) displacement powerplants.[21]

Notes

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  1. ^ "Motorcycle Design: The State We're In". BikeEXIF.com.
  2. ^ "Miguel Galluzzi, An Italian Monster Maker, Vladi Delsoglio". Ganzo Magazine. December 17, 2011.
  3. ^ a b Michelle Higgins (April 2, 2013). "Designer Miguel Galluzzi to Speak at Pro Italia". Cycle World.
  4. ^ a b "The Italians Are Coming". Pasadena Now. March 15, 2012.
  5. ^ Tom Roderick (April 25, 2013). "Ten Questions with Piaggio's VP of Design, Miguel Galluzzi". Motorcycle.com.
  6. ^ a b Ducati (2008), "1993 - The Monster", Ducati Heritage, archived from the original on May 16, 2008, retrieved January 16, 2011
  7. ^ a b Ducati (2008), "The Turnaround Years", Ducati Heritige, archived from the original on May 21, 2008, retrieved January 16, 2011
  8. ^ a b Euro Gossip, Motorcycle USA, October 20, 2006, retrieved June 14, 2009
  9. ^ Wes Siler (September 30, 2011). "Miguel Galluzzi on the new Moto Guzzi". Ride Apart. The V7 Racers, that was the first thing we really did for Guzzi. We saw at the Milan show, the reaction from people was, 'Wow, that's pretty neat.' So, we thought of making 150. Now, sales are coming from all over the world. It became a huge thing
  10. ^ "Motorcycle Design Association". Given.it.
  11. ^ a b "Top ten: Motorcycle designers - Miguel Angel Galluzzi". Visor Down. June 19, 2013.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h Frank, Aaron (December 2008), "Miguel Galluzzi? The father of the Ducati Monster reasserts himself at Aprilia", Motorcyclist, p. 20
  13. ^ Bob Berkow. "Miguel Galluzzi". Bikeexif.com.
  14. ^ a b c d e "Miguel Galluzzi", Art Center Car Classic '10, Art Center, 2009, archived from the original on June 3, 2010, retrieved April 20, 2010
  15. ^ Holmstrom, Darwin; Nelson, Brian J. (2002), BMW Motorcycles, MotorBooks International, p. 156, ISBN 0-7603-1098-X, retrieved January 14, 2011
  16. ^ a b c Cathcart, Alan (July 1993), "CW Riding Impression: Ducati M900; The Monster Lives", Cycle World, vol. 32, no. 7, Newport Beach, California: Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., pp. 42–46, ISSN 0011-4286
  17. ^ "Aprilia.(Lane Changes) (press release)", Dealernews, vol. 42, no. 13, p. 22, December 2006
  18. ^ a b Ebert, Guido (October 16, 2006), Aprilia taps new style manager (press release), vol. 9, Powersports Business, p. 29, retrieved January 16, 2011
  19. ^ a b c d e Patton, Phil (April 18, 2012), "Going West, Piaggio Thinks Big for Next Generation of Scooters", The New York Times, retrieved May 6, 2012
  20. ^ a b Cameron, Kevin (April 17, 2012), "Will The Motorcycle Of The Future Come From Pasadena? Italian motorcycle designer Miguel Galluzzi talks two-wheel transportation", Cycle World, retrieved May 6, 2012
  21. ^ a b c Ash, Kevin (May 4, 2012), "Moto Guzzi California 1400 launched", The Daily Telegraph, retrieved May 6, 2012
  22. ^ Falloon, Ian; Taglioni, Fabio (FRW) (2006), The Ducati Story: Racing and Production Models from 1945 to Present Day (4th ed.), Haynes, pp. 144–153, 192, ISBN 1-84425-322-8
  23. ^ Falloon, Ian (2004), Standard Catalog of Ducati Motorcycles 1946-2005, Iola, WI: KP Books, pp. 148–149, 156–170, ISBN 0-87349-714-7
  24. ^ Melling, Frank (April 5, 2007), "Memorable MC Cagiva Raptor 1000", MotorcycleUSA, retrieved January 18, 2011
  25. ^ "'Monster' Ducati", American Motorcyclist, vol. 47, no. 2, Westerville, Ohio: American Motorcyclist Association, p. 26, February 1993, ISSN 0277-9358, retrieved January 17, 2011
  26. ^ West, Jim (August 2006), "Monster — Ducati's 2006 Monster Challenge: finally, a biker build-off worth watching", Motorcyclist, pp. 58(5)
  27. ^ Kerr, Glynn (March 2008), "Design; The Perfect 10", Motorcycle Consumer News, vol. 39, no. 3, Irvine, California: Aviation News Corp, p. 40–41, ISSN 1073-9408
  28. ^ "RETRO/REVOLUTIONARY: 1993-1998". Guggenheim Museum, New York.
  29. ^ a b Ash, Kevin (June 3, 2006), "This beast's a beauty Kevin Ash examines Ducati's latest Monster, the 695", The Daily Telegraph, London, p. 7
  30. ^ Ash, Kevin (August 2, 2003), "The mother of all monsters", The Daily Telegraph, retrieved January 17, 2011
  31. ^ Henshaw, Peter (2006), The Encyclopedia of the Motorcycle, Chartwell Books, p. 109, ISBN 0-7858-2144-9
  32. ^ Catterson, Brian, "An Artier Ducati? Italy's next-generation sports-tourer, as seen from New Jersey", Cycle World, vol. 43, no. 2, Newport Beach, California: Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., p. 43, ISSN 0011-4286
  33. ^ Dealernews (February 1996), Milan Motorcycle Show. (1995), vol. 32, pp. 76(4)
  34. ^ Brown, Roland (2005), The Ultimate History of Fast Motorcycles, Bath, England: Parragon, pp. 209–291, ISBN 1-4054-5466-0
  35. ^ Dowds, Dowds (2002), Superbikes, Tangerine Press, ISBN 0-439-42466-6
  36. ^ Henning, Ari (2008), "Naked in the middle: updated icon or the new naked from Noale?", Motorcyclist, p. 68(8)
  37. ^ Instablogs.com (November 9, 2009), Vespa Piaggio 1+1 Generation concept is a minimalist vehicle for urban areas, retrieved January 14, 2011
  38. ^ Waheed, Adam (November 11, 2009), "Moto Guzzi V12 Concept First Look", MotorcycleUSA, retrieved January 17, 2011
  39. ^ Siler, Wes (July 22, 2010), "Pierre Terblanche and Miguel Galluzzi on the future of Moto Guzzi", Hell for Leather, retrieved January 19, 2011

References

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