The purpose of a car is to serve as a form of transportation that can take people and their things hundreds of miles with ease. As a basic rule, the average person needs such transportation to be practical, affordable, and useful in all of their daily personal functions. So what happens when a car is none of these things? What happens when a car becomes more than a bunch of nuts and bolts and is liberated from the chains of mundane reality by the vision of a single man whose passion knows no boundaries? The answer is that the car itself becomes the focus rather than the destination of travel. When not governed by real world concerns a car is free to become a living, breathing work of art, more something to be experienced than a tool to be used. It ventures into the realm of the extraordinary in a world so held down by the lame nature of the masses.

The supercar is this essence, an extreme and lawless expression of the automobile. Such machines bring occasion with them everywhere they go and the masses are stunned by such an outrageous presence among them. Society itself can come to a halt when everyone, if only for an instant, is captured by the arrival of such a machine. People stop what they’re doing, pause conversations, and some will even run though crowds knocking people off their feet just so they might get a picture of this beast that lurks among them. The whole presence of a supercar is quite rude, intrusive, and vulgar to be sure, but for some reason people love it.

In this realm of exotic cars there is one man whose passion, innovation, and drive have lead him to outdo all of the biggest names in the business. Horacio Pagani, an Argentine native with an impressive career in automotive design, is the man I speak of. His company, Pagani Automobili, came out with their first car called the Zonda C12 in 1999 and have gone on to become the new definition of the ultra exotic car. It is a very rare thing in the industry for a small upstart company to survive for long, let alone to see the type of success and acclaim that Pagani has. In only eleven years they have gone from being just another small one off supercar maker to being on of the most desired supercar brands on the planet, and are my personal favorite without question.

This is all because Pagani holds his company and himself to a higher standard–yes, even in the stratosphere of the auto industry where the limits of what can be done are governed only by your pocketbook, Pagani has managed to raise the bar even higher. His painstaking attention to every tiny detail of his cars is a large factor, but in interviews I have seen he talks about seeing the car as a whole living entity and not as just the sum of many parts. I believe that this view is the real factor in his success and the details are a result from this. A Pagani is a masterpiece of engineering, design, and vision throughout the entire car. Even such seemingly trivial parts of the car, such as the bolts, have been meticulously designed to match the vision for the car as a whole with the idea that if every single part is a masterpiece unto itself, then the entity of the finished car can be nothing short of that.

Companies like Ferrari and Lamborghini also make fantastic supercars, but their operations are much larger and everything about the build of their cars has been standardized. When compared to the likes of the Zonda or Huayra, these more mainstream supercars seem a bit dulled.  This is not to knock on them, but more to show just how truly incredible Paganis are. Sure, there are faster supercars out there, but at this level, every car is going to be insanely quick and capable of awe-inspiring speed, so from the driver’s seat it, really does not matter what the figures are. What Pagani has done is make the best supercars as far as the experience aspect is concerned. Everything about their cars is all about giving people an extraordinary experience, whether it be the driver on a winding road, or a pedestrian watching it drive by, with Pagani the occasion is second to none. These are cars that will make your day, even if you just see it drive by for a second. As far as I am concerned, the experience that a car offers is the most important thing about it, how it makes you feel in every situation. That is why Pagani is my personal favorite, because the experience is in every part of the car down to the tiniest bits. Every aspect of the car is a masterpiece of some kind, why would you want anything less from a supercar?

-Nick