New forms of communication and expression: a timeless style
In the 1990s and in the first decade of the 2000s, Pirelli’s advertising strategy featured global campaigns with icons of cinema and sport, such as Sharon Stone, Carl Lewis and Marie-José Pérec, created by large international agencies such as Young & Rubicam and Armando Testa.
The photograph of Lewis in high heels, taken by Annie Leibovitz in 1994, is an indelible image in the history of visual communication and the headline "Power is Nothing without Control" became a milestone in international advertising. Still today it is the distinctive slogan of the "Capital P".
In 1995, Pirelli and FC Internazionale signed a partnership agreement that put the Long P logo onto the jerseys of the Milanese soccer team. 1997 saw the arrival at Inter of a Brazilian striker named Luís Nazário de Lima: Ronaldo, who was chosen as the face of the 1998 tyre campaign.
To a concept by Young & Rubicam and created by the photographer Ken Griffiths, the image of the football champion in the position of the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro immediately became a viral icon. Accompanied by the words "Power is nothing without control", a press campaign was created around the powerful figure of the star and then combined with the new "universal" Pirelli P3000 tyre, as well as the P6000 and Winter.
World magazine was founded in 1994. This bi-annual publication represents the spirit of Pirelli, covering ideas about art, culture, technology, business and life. Along with star names such as Frances McDormand and Natalie Portman, recent editions have included interviews with key figures such as New York Times CEO Mark Thompson, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and designers Jasper Morrison and Yves Béhar.
They have featured chefs, travel, sport and articles on current issues such as DNA testing and artificial intelligence, along with behind-the-scenes insights into the latest exhibitions at Pirelli HangarBicocca gallery in Milan.
Pirelli has often talked about tyres and their world, focusing not only on their function, but also extrapolating them from their context, building stories and images capable of evoking other worlds, values, aspirations and dreams. This is how, over time, an apparently round and black object has developed a real "rubber soul".
Continuing in a tradition of 'lateral' storytelling, from 2010 to today even the Pirelli Annual Reports have undergone a transformation: from "simple" financial statements they have in fact become communication tools in a broader sense, able to illustrate a year of company history, using contribution of personalities from the world of art and culture at an international level.
In the last decade, the figures in the financial statements have thus become part of a broader story that aims to capture the spirit and values of Pirelli by combining the typical contents of economic-financial reports with artistic expressions - from photos to drawings, from paintings to graffiti. - and copyrighted texts, all created ad hoc to tell the most intangible part of the company.
Pirelli has often talked about tyres and their world, focusing not only on their function, but also extrapolating them from their context, building stories and images capable of evoking other worlds, values, aspirations and dreams. This is how, over time, an apparently round and black object has developed a real “rubber soul”.
Continuing in a tradition of 'lateral' storytelling, from 2010 to today even the Pirelli Annual Reports have undergone a transformation: from "simple" financial statements they have in fact become communication tools in a broader sense, able to illustrate a year of company history, using contribution of personalities from the world of art and culture at an international level.
In the last decade, the figures in the financial statements have thus become part of a broader story that aims to capture the spirit and valuesof Pirelli by combining the typical contents of economic-financial reports with artistic expressions - from photos to drawings, from paintings to graffiti. - and copyrighted texts, all created ad hoc to tell the most intangible part of the company.
Pirelli has often talked about tyres and their world, focusing not only on their function, but also extrapolating them from their context, building stories and images capable of evoking other worlds, values, aspirations and dreams. This is how, over time, an apparently round and black object has developed a real “rubber soul”.
Continuing in a tradition of 'lateral' storytelling, from 2010 to today even the Pirelli Annual Reports have undergone a transformation: from "simple" financial statements they have in fact become communication tools in a broader sense, able to illustrate a year of company history, using contribution of personalities from the world of art and culture at an international level.
In the last decade, the figures in the financial statements have thus become part of a broader story that aims to capture the spirit and values of Pirelli by combining the typical contents of economic-financial reports with artistic expressions - from photos to drawings, from paintings to graffiti. - and copyrighted texts, all created ad hoc to tell the most intangible part of the company.