Porsche and Pixar Worked Together to Create a Real-Life Sally Carrera Inspired by Cars

In 2006, Disney-Pixar released Cars, a film about talking automobiles. It was a highly successful film, grossing over $460 million in the global box office and launching a franchise that included sequels and spinoffs. 

While the main protagonist in the film is a red race car named Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson), a pivotal character is Sally Carrera (voiced by Bonnie Hunt), a blue car patterned after the 2002 Porsche 911 Carrera. Sally is a lawyer who moves to the town of Radiator Springs and becomes the love interest of Lightning McQueen.

Photo by Porsche.

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Sixteen years after the release of the film, Porsche and Pixar have once again come together to unveil a one-of-a-kind car—the Sally Special. The real life 911 car (sadly without the eyes in the windshield) was crafted by the Porsche engineering and design team in collaboration with the original animators who worked on the movie Cars. It will be auctioned off for charity later this month.

During an exclusive video call with members of the media in Asia Pacific, Porsche and Pixar representatives in Porsche’s home city of Stuttgart explained how the project was really a tribute to Sally, although they didn’t want to make it look too “cartoony.” 

Photo by Porsche.

Starting in November 2021, the Sally Special project was a reunion of sorts for the original Cars team, which included Jay Ward, creative director of franchise at Pixar Animation Studios, and Bob Pauley, the production designer who first drew Sally Carrera for the Cars film. They worked with members of the Sonderwunsch team at Porsche Exclusive Manufaktur in Stuttgart and designers from Style Porsche in Weissach.

Ten months later, the team finally lifted the cover off of the Sally Special. 

Photo by Porsche.

“We had great fun creating 911 Sally Special and it’s the first time we’ve worked on a project of this kind,” Ward said. “We decided early on that we wanted to create a completely drivable 911, inspired by Sally Carrera, but just not an exact copy. Sally Carrera loves to drive—that was our inspiration. We asked ourselves: if Sally were built today as a road-approved model, what would she look like?’

Photo by Porsche.

Based on the fastest and most agile variant of the 911 Carrera model line, the 480-PS 911 Carrera GTS, the 911 Sally Special is equipped with a manual gearbox and is painted in a special color that the team refers to as Sallybluemetallic, which was applied by hand.

The design team also completely overhauled the 911’s interiors. According to Porsche interior designer Daniela Miloševi?, they were given complete freedom to work on the Sally Special. The team used the Sallybluemetallic inside and developed a special Pepita houndstooth pattern for the upholstery in three colors. 

Besides the car, the winning bidder will also get a special timepiece: a chronograph by Porsche Design that was also created in collaboration with Pixar. The watch’s coloured ring is also painted in Sallybluemetallic, while the chalk-colored leather strap has Speed Blue stitching that can be swapped with a second strap with opposite qualities: Speed Blue with chalk-colored stitching. 

Photo by Porsche.

The best thing about the Sally Special is that it will be auctioned off to benefit a great cause: A portion of the proceeds will go to Girls Inc., a non-profit that equips girls with the knowledge and skills to effect positive changes in their lives and become leaders who will change the world, while the other portion will go to the United Nations Refugee Agency, which supports more than 6.2 million refugees who have been forced to flee their homes due to the war in Ukraine.

Photo by Porsche.

The Porsche 911 Sally Special will be auctioned by RM Sotheby’s on Saturday (August 20) during Monterey Car Week in California. Unfortunately, only U.S. citizens are eligible to participate. For more information, visit this site.