| Nicola Crea Short curriculum 2016 Born in 1957, he is a design manager, expert in industrial product development and university design teacher. In 1982 he graduated from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California (U.S.A.). The same year he moved to Turin where he started working as a designer for “Pininfarina Studi & Ricerche”. From 1983 to 1986 he worked as a senior designer at “I.DE.A. Institute”. In 1986 he was hired by Fiat Auto as design manager and studio chief in charge of exterior design of Fiat cars. Later and until 1992 he became manager of exterior design of Lancia cars at Centro Stile Lancia. One remarkable result of his engagement is the development of the Lancia Delta Integrale. In 1992 he started its collaboration with “Giannini Automobili”. He was engaged as director of design and in charge of new products development. In only four years he achieved the task to qualify Giannini as “carrozzeria” in ANFIA, national association of coachbuilders. In 1996, at the Turin International Auto Show, Giannini, in parallel with all the major Italian coachbuilders, has been invited by Fiat Auto to develop a show car based on the new Brava. Giannini presents Windsurf, a coupé with very advanced aerodynamic concept, entirely conceived and developed by Crea. Meantime, since 1992, he widens his interest to the design of boats and motorcycles. He starts consultancies with “Victory design”, engineering studio devoted to yacht design, based in Naples, and “Majestic Auto”, Indian industry producer of motorcycle and mopeds. In both cases Crea has the opportunity to transfer the specific knowledge and the development technologies in use in the automotive field to these other product sectors. From 1996 to 1998 he moved to Germany to work for “Daimler-Chrysler” at the Mercedes-Benz Advanced Design studio in Sindelfingen (Stuttgart). From 1999 on, his engagements are shared between design consultancies and teaching. In the following years he is involved with the Universities of Pescara, Genoa and the Politecnico di Milano as teacher in their courses of studies. During this period of time he develops projects with several companies such as Tecnema, Picchio, Bizzarrini and Tasso (now Italcar) in many cases creating a synergy between industry and the academic world. He gives a strong contribution in the institution of CISME (Centro Interdipartimentale di Studi sulla Mobilità Ecosostenibile), a center of studies on sustainable mobility. In 2006 he became director of CISME Research Center, creating permanent links with other research institutions. Meanwhile, he became member of the scientific committee as well as coordinator of all design activities for Tulton, company specialized in new products development. From 2007 he is professor of the Politecnico di Milano where he runs the courses of “Creativity tools” and a multidisciplinary “Project Lab” with a bio-engineer and performs his research activity. He is project Tutor in the master on Automobile Design organized with Fiat Group Automobiles 2007-2010 (Fiat, Alfa Romeo and Maserati) and with Volkswagen group since 2011. He is member of the research unit of Advanced design (UDR ADD). He is member of the commission for new patents evaluation for the Facoltà del Design of the Politecnico di Milano. He has been project leader of interdisciplinary projects for the Alta Scuola Politecnica. In the years 2005-2010 he has been in charge of Strategic Design courses at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Genova. From 2008 to 2012 he is partner and President of the Scientific Committee of Milano cardesign, company devoted to research, design and production of prototypes and limited series vehicles. He has several minor consultancies on design management (Natuzzi, DeA, Conrero engineering, Cisitalia, ACTR). He is also been involved in projects aimed to internationalization and Design Culture in India, north-Africa (EC financed project Tempus - I-cre@) and Brazil. He spent the year 2014 in USA at the University of Cincinnati teaching transportation design and working on a research on Design thinking and Creativity. From 2014 he is also Principal Lecturer and Course Director of Automotive & Transportation design at Coventry University in the UK. |
