ROYAL AUTO

PAOLO GARELLA IS like a cat. Throughout his 35-year career as an engineer he has lived many lives, any one of which would be the highlight of most people’s resume, working with not only automotive royalty but actual royalty. Despite his success, his story is still being written, but the 61-year-old generously donated his time during a long drive from his Italian home to talk MOTOR through his journey thus far. And what a journey.

Born in 1959, Garella grew up in a small town south of Turin in an automotive family. His father introduced him to the wonder of cars and his uncle was the general manager at Ducati, but it was an annual local event that would light the path ahead. “One thing that very strongly inspired my career was every year there was the Turin Motor Show. It was always a dream to go and see those fantastic cars and one year Pininfarina [showed] the Ferrari Pinin. For me that was a shock, I thought ‘this is what I want to do’. The car is important in my memory.”

DURING HIS 35-YEAR CAREER PAOLO GARELLA HAS WORKED NOT ONLY WITH AUTOMOTIVE ROYALTY BUT ACTUAL ROYALTY

Having graduated from the Politecnico di Torino as a mechanical engineer, Garella began working for Goodyear at its Mireval proving ground in the south of France as a test engineer. “I really learned what the car should do. It was really very, very important for what I’ve done since, to be able to judge a car, to drive everything that was on the market for four or five years. There were people from France, from Belgium, from Germany, it was an incredible mixing pot of competence and ideas of the handling of a car, the comfort.” The work was varied, Garella’s image archives showing everything from a Peugeot 309 GTi to a Ferrari F40 to a giant mining truck. His main project during this time was the creation of a new wet handling circuit at Mireval, a crucial component in tyre development. “If I had to pick a memory from Goodyear I will pick the work we did on the wet handling track. That was an incredibly advanced project that involved tens of people from the two sides of the ocean so it was a little bit of the true starting point of my career as a manager, to be able to put together a group of incredible people to reach an extraordinary achievement.”

From there Garella joined Albatech, where he worked on unusual concept projects like the electric Bertone Blitz and two-stroke Pininfarina Ethos