Blue Jewel

Emma Hague still remembers the first time she was smitten. She was sweet seventeen. And she fell head-over-heels for a sharp-featured Italian. An F40, to be precise.

“A very good friend of my father’s came over. He’d just bought a brand-new Ferrari and he took me for a ride in it,” she says, her eyes twinkling at the memory. “The best part was, when we got back he let me drive it up the driveway of the house.”

The memory of that wedge-shaped Ferrari F40 still makes her face light up today, admitting that she was “totally and utterly captivated” by the idea of owning a Prancing Horse from that moment on.

Now, after enjoying major success with a firm specialising in data analytics for the healthcare sector, she eventually consummated her passion for Ferrari back in 2014, buying a 458 Italia. Then, after her local Ferrari dealer suggested Tailor Made, she listened, was intrigued, but wanted to wait for the right car to come along: “It had to be something stunning.” When the 812 GTS was launched she decided “Yes! That’s the car!”

Sitting in a quintessentially English village in the achingly pretty rural county of Devon, deep in the heart of England’s bucolic ‘Westcountry’, she remembers vividly her visit to Maranello.

“I was totally and utterly overwhelmed when I walked into the Tailor Made department,” she admits, smiling broadly. It was the first time she’d been up-close-and- personal with an 812 GTS, which at the time still hadn’t been officially launched in the UK.

Characteristically, Emma had arrived at Maranello already with a very clear priority in mind. “For me the main thing was the colour of the car,” she insists. Her aim was to colour-match an astonishing blue sapphire-diamond ring she’d had designed by her favourite London jeweller.

The sheer number of bodywork tones available at Tailor Made left her astonished. That same day they succeeded in matching her beloved ring to a particular blue, which has been named after her, she adds, proudly, with perhaps the slightest of demure blushes.

Emma had no ‘theme’ in mind. But, “I knew what I wanted because the 812 GTS is such a classic, beautiful car,” she enthuses. “I wanted to add very small, classy details. I’ve always loved the Poltrona Frau leather and I’ve always liked Loro Piana cashmere.”

This unusual use of cashmere sees a grey woollen strip curving its way around the edge of the seats and down the central console. “I’d liken it to an evening suit with a gorgeous pin stripe down the side, in a different fabric.”

Her favourite tones – grey, blue, and red – dominate the interior. For the Poltrona Frau leather seating she chose an unusual “kind of Amarone red”. Red also appears on the central dial on a dashboard that is in leather.

“Red, navy, and grey are just such beautiful colours combined. And they are the colours I wear usually, winter or summer,” she says. Fittingly, the red headrests sport the Prancing Horse symbol hand-stitched in grey.

“I don’t have a background in design,” she admits. “I just know what I like.” Indeed, in a highly individual departure, this “just a country girl at heart” car-lover opted to have Prancing Horse badges “on the front grille and on the back of the boot” not in the more usual ‘polished’ version, but rather in a matt finish. All chrome work inside the car is also matt, including the air vents. The result was a “satin effect, like a brushed aluminium look,” she says.

Was she pleased with the end result of her Tailor Made adventure? “Oh, it was way better than I’d imagined,” she gasps, gifting a broad generous smile at the memory of the emotional day she collected the 812 GTS at the Exeter dealership. “I was in tears,” she recalls. “I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was. It was incredibly emotional just because it is such a magnificent car,” she says, slowly shaking her head. “Such ... a magnificent car.”