75 PIRELLI 1872, Milan, Italy Founder Giovanni Battista Pirelli Company Pirelli & C. SpA HQ Milan, Italy www.pirelli.com
The Italian tire manufacturer Pirelli was established in 1872. Producing all kinds of rubber products, the company started making tires for bicycles in 1890 and expanded to cars and motorcycles shortly after. A request from an American Pirelli representative to come up with a distinctive and memorable logo in an era of maximized advertising resulted in the idea of stretching out the initial P to form a roof over the other characters of the brand name in 1907. Pirelli also had a major success that year, with Prince Scipione Borghese winning the Peking-Paris car race on Pirelli tyres. Without clear corporate guidelines on how to use the logo, it appeared in many variations according to whatever was popular at the time; the logos shown here represent only a small selection. The elongated P with its clever shift from thick to thin and back was a highly evocative way to portray the elasticity of Pirelli’s premium products. Despite the variety, Pirelli had no difficulty becoming an iconic brand.
‘Pirelli Stella Bianca’, ad, 1930s
Although the number of variants diminished progressively after the 1930s stricter rules were sorely needed. In 1945, following WWII, a strong, clear sans serif logo was created which has remained practically untouched until this day.
Pirelli is an official supplier of tires for Formula 1. Shown here: the 2011 P Zero red supersoft compound, yellow soft compound, and grey hard compound