McLaren turns Las Vegas into a rolling artwork with Project Viva
McLaren’s special operations team has once again shown how far imagination can stretch before it crystallises into a real car. Project Viva, a one off 750S Spider, sounds like something from a theatre programme, yet it marks a moment where design and engineering collide with such confidence that even the Nevada desert light feels a touch subdued.
McLaren Special Operations shaped Project Viva around the rhythm of Las Vegas. The approach, however, refused to mimic the city’s neon glare. Instead of copying its colours, MSO stripped the palette back to black and white graphics. The team calls it a reminder that McLaren prefers to avoid comfort zones and reinterpret inspiration on its own terms.
The body carries a hand painted Sketch in Motion, a visual story built from the city’s famous signs, tower block silhouettes, music and stage born character. Every piece folds together into a narrative that links Las Vegas folklore with McLaren’s rally roots and its particular logic of design.
Viva uses MSO exclusive colours. Muriwai White connects to the Muriwai House theme, while Vegas Nights, created specifically for this car, glints across a deep black surface with particles of cyan, violet and green. The result captures the glow of Las Vegas at night without resorting to any loud strokes of colour.
The project becomes more personal with a few touches from Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. They added their own lines and symbols, including a mark near the rear bumper that celebrates McLaren’s tenth constructors’ title. One glance at it, and at the car as a whole, underlines how the company’s success stretches across art and racing at the same time.
MSO boss Jonathan Simms describes Viva as proof that any idea can turn into a tangible object with its own personality. The point is not to create something merely decorative. It is to tell a story that begins either with the brand or with a client’s imagination, then build a car that expresses that inspiration clearly and honestly.
Project Viva goes on display in mid November at McLaren’s base inside the Wynn Las Vegas hotel and remains there until Grand Prix week. In short, it is a heavily pitched piece of PR dressed as a very elaborately painted car, built to draw eyes during the upcoming F1 weekend.
