The Coldplay bass player pays Ferrari a visit with his 365 GTC

All of us dream of turning our hobbies into money-making businesses, to be able to make a living doing the thing we love. Guy Berryman, the bass player with Coldplay, has actually gone one better. Berryman has turned his love of music into a huge, global success, but now he's also flipped everything on its head and turned his intended profession into a passionate hobby.

‘I enrolled in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at University College London,’ he explains. ‘I was sure this would be my life. Music was an important hobby, but still just a hobby. However...’

However, at university Berryman met Chris Martin, Will Champion and Jonny Buckland, and together they formed Coldplay, one of the most famous bands of recent years.

Guy Berryman visits Maranello's Classiche Department

His love for engineering never left him. It was something he inherited this from his father Rupert, one of the engineers who worked on the Channel Tunnel project. He also inherited a love for classic cars from his father. Berryman grew up surrounded by four-wheel jewels and, when he could afford to, began his own collection, including, of course, Ferraris.

‘I admire the attention to detail that Ferrari has always put into its models, both from the point of view of the engines and the design. One of my favourites is a 275 GTB that I bought in the US, a barn-find. I brought it back to England and started restoring it, to return it to its original shape.

'Its owner had modified the body, changing the nose, from a short nose to a long nose. Now it’s back to how it was. It also has fantastic colours: pine green on the outside, orange interiors… And I have a weakness for this 365 GTC.’

The musician arrived at Maranello at the wheel of his wonderful Gran Turismo, which he entrusted to the attentive care of the Classiche Department for a general service and to restore it to its original colour, before gaining an authenticity certificate.

The bass player's vintage collection includes a 365 GTC and a 275 GTB

‘I drove here from England,’ says Berryman. ‘I took a week's holiday at the end of a long world tour and before the next one, which will start from Australia, cross Europe [with two dates in Milan in July] and then America and Asia. I drove for about three to four hours a day in France, Switzerland and then Italy.

‘And I do admit to feeling a certain emotion at the thought that this car left this factory in 1969 and has now returned here, in the company of many other extraordinary models. It must have thought: “Home at last”.’

18 October 2016