AUTOMOBILI PININFARINA B95 RECEIVES RED DOT AWARD FOR DESIGN CONCEPT

Automotive design has long occupied a distinctive place within the Pininfarina story, where proportion, sculpture and engineering have traditionally been considered as closely connected as performance itself. The Automobili Pininfarina B95 takes that philosophy into a new category, combining the visual drama of an open Barchetta with an all-electric powertrain and an exceptionally limited production run. Now, the model has received the Red Dot Award: Design Concept 2025, recognising its design quality and innovation.

The award follows the B95’s growing collection of international design accolades and comes one year after Automobili Pininfarina’s PURA Vision received the same Red Dot distinction in 2024. The recognition places the B95 within a continuing design narrative for the young electric marque, whose vehicles are conceived around the company’s PURA philosophy and developed in Cambiano, Italy.

At its core, the B95 is an interpretation of the Barchetta — an open, lightweight form traditionally associated with racing and intimate interaction between driver, machine and surroundings. Automobili Pininfarina has translated that idea into a contemporary hypercar with no conventional roof or windscreen. Instead, the cockpit is defined by two individually adjustable aero screens, designed to provide aerodynamic protection while preserving the sense of openness that is central to the Barchetta concept.

Its proportions are deliberately dramatic. The body wraps around the front of the car in a continuous sculptural form, with a high swage line creating a muscular profile. The absence of a conventional roof places greater emphasis on the relationship between the bodywork and the occupants, while the low-slung silhouette gives the car the visual character of a futuristic interpretation of a classic racing machine.

The B95 was conceived as a coachbuilt vehicle rather than a conventional series-production model. Only ten examples are being produced, with each car individually curated in collaboration with its owner. Production and deliveries began in 2025, coinciding with the 95th anniversary of Pininfarina SpA, the historic Italian design house from which the Automobili Pininfarina name draws its heritage. The B95’s name reflects that connection: “B” refers to Barchetta, while “95” marks the anniversary.

That limited production philosophy extends to the way each car is created. The B95 is designed and engineered by Automobili Pininfarina’s teams in Cambiano, then hand-crafted there in collaboration with Pininfarina SpA. Rather than treating personalisation as an afterthought, the process allows individual clients to influence the specification of their cars, reinforcing the connection between coachbuilding and contemporary electric performance.

The design itself follows Automobili Pininfarina’s PURA philosophy, which seeks to take inspiration from significant cars in the Pininfarina heritage and reinterpret their underlying forms for a new era. On the B95, this can be seen in the relationship between its clean surfaces and exaggerated proportions. The result is neither a conventional retro design nor a purely futuristic exercise; instead, familiar sporting references are abstracted into a more sculptural language.

Materials contribute significantly to that impression. The bodywork can be finished with layered paint containing metallic elements, creating depth that changes with the surrounding light. Precision-machined and polished exterior components sit alongside exposed carbon-fibre details, while the wheels combine dark surfaces with contrasting machined sections. Inside, the cockpit continues the relationship between craftsmanship and technology, with the dashboard extending the visual lines of the exterior into the cabin.

The B95 also draws heavily from the technical foundations of the Battista, Automobili Pininfarina’s electric hyper GT. The company describes the B95 as sharing the Battista’s high-performance electric powertrain architecture, adapted specifically for the Barchetta. The broader powertrain delivers up to 1,900 hp, with four electric motors and all-wheel drive, allowing the car to combine extreme acceleration with the immediate response characteristic of high-output electric propulsion.

Yet the B95’s significance is not simply measured in performance figures. Its importance lies in what the format allows Automobili Pininfarina to explore. Removing the roof changes the relationship between the driver and the environment, while the absence of mass-market constraints gives the design team greater freedom to experiment with proportions, surfaces and detailing. In that sense, the B95 functions as both a hypercar and an expression of the possibilities offered by coachbuilt electric mobility.

The Red Dot recognition is particularly relevant because the award evaluates design concepts for qualities including design quality and innovation. The B95’s selection follows the PURA Vision’s win in 2024, suggesting a developing consistency in Automobili Pininfarina’s design direction rather than an isolated success. The B95 has also received other design recognition, including an iF Design Award and several automotive and product-design distinctions in 2024.

The company behind it is itself relatively young, despite being connected to one of Italy’s most established design names. Automobili Pininfarina was established in 2018 by Mahindra & Mahindra as an electric luxury carmaker, with its headquarters and principal design, engineering and operational activities based in Cambiano, near Turin. The company’s creation gave the Pininfarina name a new role: rather than designing vehicles for other manufacturers, it could now develop and produce complete Pininfarina-branded cars.

That distinction is important when considering the B95. Pininfarina’s design heritage stretches across decades and includes hundreds of vehicles created for some of the world’s most recognised automotive marques. Automobili Pininfarina represents the fulfilment of a longer ambition within that history: creating complete cars under the Pininfarina name. The B95, with its hand-built construction and tiny production run, is perhaps one of the clearest expressions of that transition.

For clients in the UAE, Automobili Pininfarina has historically operated through specialist retail partner Adamas Motors, with the brand establishing its Middle Eastern presence in Dubai. Current third-party market listings continue to show Automobili Pininfarina vehicles in Dubai, although the manufacturer’s public website does not currently expose a live UAE city-by-city locator detailed enough to present those locations as a current official store listing.

The B95’s Red Dot Award therefore arrives at an interesting point in Automobili Pininfarina’s development. The marque is still young, but its design language is becoming increasingly recognisable, built around dramatic proportions, sophisticated surfaces and the freedom afforded by electric architecture. With only ten B95s being created, the model will remain an exceptionally rare expression of that philosophy.

Ultimately, the B95 demonstrates how electric performance can open a different chapter in coachbuilt design. Its significance is not only that it replaces conventional propulsion with electric power, but that it uses the freedom of that technology to reconsider the form of the automobile itself. In Cambiano, a century-spanning design heritage is being translated into something deliberately scarce,  open and forward-looking — a reminder that the future of automotive design can still begin with the simple act of imagining a different shape.