McLaren has unveiled a special Google Chrome livery for the British Grand Prix this weekend that celebrates its last world championship victories.
In a throwback to the chrome designs that McLaren ran from 2007 to 2014, the team’s current livery has been updated with significant chrome additions alongside the papaya sections. McLaren’s last world title came in 2008 — the same year Google Chrome was launched — and is celebrated as part of its 60th anniversary at its home race at Silverstone.
“It’s no secret that racing fans love McLaren’s classic chrome livery,” McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown said. “Google Chrome wanted to bring back elements of this iconic livery to celebrate our team’s history at the British Grand Prix, and we’re excited to be able to give our fans what they want.
“I’m sure this livery will bring back great memories for many of our fans, and I can’t wait to see it out on track at our home race.”
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Brown says McLaren could have gone further with the design but a combination of rules and its current brand image played a part in combining the two.
“We want to keep our papaya identity. It’s very important for us that we give a nod to the past, but very much look forward to the future. There’s also so many times you can change the livery into extremes, so what we did in Monaco a couple of years ago, you’re only really allowed to do a couple of times, and then to kind of have variations of your base scheme, you can do a little bit more often.
“I think the rules aside, it was important to us — we’re really trying to build our association with papaya much like Ferrari’s red and Mercedes have their color identity, we get a lot of feedback from the fans who really like the papaya. That’s why we went with the combination.”
Lando Norris says the livery is a special one for him as it reflects the period that helped him fall in love with Formula 1 as a kid, and that he has tried to get Brown to integrate the chrome colors over a number of years.
“Probably over 1300 days or something since I joined McLaren!” Norris said. “2018, it was one of the first things I probably said to (Brown). I’m pretty sure from what I remember it was when he showed me the livery that we were going to have for 2019, and he asked me, ‘What would you change on the car?” and I was like: ‘The whole thing!’
“Just because for me, walking down the boulevard, as much as I would like the white and bright orange — that livery was amazing — I think just there’s no other car nowadays that is like the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes that we had back then. And that’s what I grew up watching, that’s what I fell in love with in many ways. I feel like I can say it, it inspired me to be a Formula 1 driver.
“Before that I was more into MotoGP, motorbikes, motocross, quad biking… That’s what I loved to begin with and I didn’t really know much about racing. Then I got into watching some Formula 1 and it was Lewis (Hamilton) versus Fernando (Alonso) even though they were in the same team, and that’s what I really fell in love with.
“Kind of getting to relive that — I’d say every year I’ve been pestering him a little bit to want to go back a little bit in that direction. I know it’s only for one race but it’s kind of cool to relive a little bit of what got me into Formula 1 in some ways, also knowing that it’s a very historic part of McLaren. They were very successful then, it’s when Lewis won his first world championship and things like that. So it’s very special.”