Our latest crossover—2009 Ford Flex—offers more functionality, flexibility and style honed, in part, by a fashion designer turned car guy.
Blurring Design Boundaries
Anthony Prozzi, formerly a designer with Donna Karan, is now blurring the boundaries between fashion, interior design, product design and automotive design.
Inside the all-new 2009 Ford Flex, Prozzi and the Ford design team created an interior with a unique combination of colors, textures and materials to create different design themes based on the types of people they envisioned owning this vehicle.
Designing for the Consumer
Working on unique interiors for 2009 Ford Flex, Prozzi's creations spanned from the "Urban Naturalist," which embraces those who want to feel like they're in touch with nature, to the "Sophisticate," for those who appreciate vehicle interior leather with intriguing grains, like alligator or ostrich in quilted patterns like those found on a Chanel handbag.
Prozzi, a born-and-bred New Yorker, enjoyed the challenge of doing something that didn't compromise. For the "Sophisticate," for example, he wanted to create an interior that says "I'm sophisticated" but did it in a new way.
Drawing on his fashion background and inspired by fabrics and materials, Prozzi helped create a brand-new vehicle he hopes will make customers wonder if it came off the catwalk.
A Fashionable Background
Prozzi's introduction to fashion and design started at an exclusive retail shop in Brooklyn named Jimmy's in 1981. After a stint in retail, Prozzi worked as a contributing editor at W magazine, followed by a job as a technical designer for Donna Karan in the '90s. College for Creative Studies brought Prozzi to Detroit, and his work as a Ford interior designer keeps him there.
Prozzi finds inspiration in his surroundings and pays particular attention to fashion, home decor and architecture and perhaps most importantly, the people with whom he interacts.
