SOURCE MATERIALS

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Making a masterpiece begins with a vision. The sculptor sees a version of the finished form in the mass of raw material, already planning the path from which a heavenly body will be rendered from a hill of rock. Driving south from Maserati’s Modena home to the marble quarries at Carrara is to witness the forging of new forms, animated and electrified where elements collide. Plains into hills, into the Apennines and down into a Ligurian Sea crowned with heat haze, where rock becomes sand, into sea, into vapour, somewhere becoming rain. And then a swipe in the calm of the cockpit recoils the GranCabrio Folgore roof. Any shower, however refreshing, can be weathered.

But we’re onward, Maserati’s electric pace thrilling us towards the white shimmer of Carrara. Michelangelo would sculpt with nothing other than the white magic that was mined here for millennia and where a busy community of artists, such as Valeria Greco, continue to chisel and wonder at the hill’s manna. Slowing the GranCabrio Folgore to a stop, surrounded by cliffs of marble yet to become works of art, is to be blinded by a brilliance both natural and man-made.

 

CAUSING A RIPPLE

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Harnessing the elements always leave a little waste. It’s a nod to God that we’re happy not to steal his thunder. But we’re leaving the heavy weather behind to embrace the ideal end of the Italian summer, when the lazy sun’s hazy fruitfulness brings a golden shimmer to all in thrall to its rays. The GranCabrio Folgore’s roof is neatly stowed away as we race from the arrow-straight beaches of Viareggio past the geometrical lounger layouts at Forte dei Marmi; out of Tuscany towards the historic towns of Liguria’s Cinque Terre for a sunset marked with a splash, more elements mixing their magic for our photographer’s lens. At Manarola, the stacked old houses seem to sigh at sundown as divers plunge into the blue and the surf raises a ripple of applause. The cliff roads wind and whirl us towards vistas unchanging and some too wild to be charted. The GranCabrio Folgore’s power and poise has shifted horizons from hills to shorelines and there is nothing in our mirrors but the road’s sweet memory.

THE SKY'S THE LIMIT

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Journey’s end. A shame with more to explore but the thrill of the drive is not over. Next month’s Maserati adventure is a mere change in the weather away.

With the GranCabrio Folgore, we went in search of summer and chased the season until we saw its elements evolve into dazzling dark blue skies, heavy with heat, tempered by cotton clouds. We witnessed landscapes right at the horizon’s edge, zipping into history in our mirrors. The GranCabrio Folgore is a velvet glove that grasps the might of Maserati’s all-electric, all-wheel-drive powertrain that delivers 761hp.

It leaps to a peak in seconds or cossets at cruising speeds in a cabin of phenomenal comfort and quality, subtle in leather and conscious in Econyl recycled nylon. The roar and rumble for which Maserati is beloved has been acoustically engineered, enhanced electronically rather than lost to the four winds forever. The marque springs eternal. Elements harnessed once again.

As late summer’s leaves turn, we engage the roof and connect our charger. Around the corner, another elemental adventure awaits.