When former Apple design wizard Jony Ive decided to reshape Maranello’s legacy, nobody expected a low-key response. Enter the Ferrari Luce, the brand’s first-ever fully electric production model, unveiled in May with a cool base price tag of €550,000. Designed in a five-year joint effort between Ferrari and Ive’s Studio LoveFrom, the vehicle immediately sparked a firestorm of online criticism, with keyboard critics comparing its polarizing exterior to mass-market electric commuting pods.
Taking the stage alongside Ferrari Chairman John Elkann at a tech conference in Turin, Ive publicly defended the controversial EV. His argument? Seeing a car on a tiny smartphone screen is vastly different from standing next to it in the metal.
Acknowledging that creating something new and different is easy if it’s bad, Ive insisted the real challenge was making it different because it’s inherently better. Of course, he casually added, designers have zero control over whether customers actually like the end product—a comforting thought when dropping over half a million euros.
Underneath the debate sits a genuine mechanical monster. As Ferrari’s first four-door, five-seat production vehicle, the Luce features four electric motors drawing power from a massive 122 kWh battery running on an 880-volt architecture. Assembled in Maranello, this setup pumps out an astounding 772 kW (1,050 HP), launching the grand tourer from 0 to 100 km/h in a staggering 2.5 seconds, with a top speed exceeding 310 km/h and a range over 530 kilometers.
While the exterior styling continues to divide the internet, the retro-futuristic cabin has earned glowing praise. Rejecting screen-heavy minimalism, Ive packed the interior with premium materials, tactile physical controls meant to be operated without looking, and a start-up ritual featuring a physical key that changes color upon insertion.
Whether the Luce is the ultimate vision of mobility or just an expensive fashion statement remains up for debate, but as Ive noted, while it might not be the future, it is undeniably part of Ferrari’s future.