"Larry Shinoda and Bill Mitchell for the absolutely incredible design and Zora Arkus-Duntov for the engineering, which was way ahead of its time, have created a masterpiece."

DRAW ME A CAR

Maximilian Büsser, founder of the watchmaking company MB&F, has successfully combined two passions within his MAD Gallery. There, he exhibits his watchmaking work alongside kinetic and automotive art. He briefly outlines his career and his love for a 1960s icon.

I wasn't yet four years old, it was 1971, and my father gave me a 1966 car almanac. A book of over 250 pages that seemed bigger than me. Each page was dedicated to a car of the year. A very lonely only child, I devoured it. I learned it by heart.

My father was born in 1922. He never really played with me. I don't remember him ever saying "well done" or "I love you." But he always loved cars. Subconsciously, I wanted to get his attention. So, whenever we were out for a drive, I would describe all the makes and models to him—he seemed proud or amused, and that was enough for me. Our annual trips to the Geneva Motor Show with him became the highlight of the year. I wonder now if he realized the intensity of the happiness I felt spending that special time with him.

So it's not entirely by chance that from the age of four to eighteen, I drew cars non-stop. My notebooks were filled with them, and it became clear: I would be an automotive designer. Then, in a happy coincidence, in 1985, just as I was taking my baccalaureate exams, the Pasadena Art Center, which happens to be the best automotive design school in the world, based in California, opened its European center in Switzerland. Destiny was within my grasp, just twenty minutes from home! Unfortunately, my parents simply couldn't afford to pay for my studies. They told me they would find a way for me to go, but I didn't dare ask them for such a huge financial sacrifice. So I made a more sensible choice and became a microtechnology engineer. A five-year ordeal during which I came close to depression.

Fortunately, discovering the microcosm of fine mechanical watchmaking (a small world struggling to survive at the time) allowed me to keep my head above water. It was ultimately by chance that, in 1991, I found my first job as a product manager at the small Jaeger-LeCoultre manufacture… “and the rest is history,” as the English say. Fine watchmaking saved me. It gave me a job I love, a family, a sense of purpose. I owe it everything, but I have never forgotten my first love.

In 2013, I stumbled upon a beautifully restored 1965 Corvette Sting Ray (C2) by Olivier de Siebenthal, and it was love at first sight, like an overwhelming and irresistible urge to own it. It would take me several years to understand this impulse: the car that most impressed me in my father's 1966 almanac was a… black Sting Ray, and one of my favorite toy cars straight from my childhood is this red Sting Ray photographed by MyLittleRedCar. Sixty years after its creation, it stirs a wave of emotion wherever it goes, and every time I look at it, I'm four years old again…

Maximillian Büsser for MyLittleRedCar

"That's how destinies are: Little Max was always drawing cars. 'Later I'll be a car designer.' When he grew up he would eventually become a watchmaker and he would win the most prestigious watchmaking award at the 22nd Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève: the Aiguille d'Or."

BONUS

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