Nine-year-old creates ‘Car of the Future’ after winning nationwide ‘MINI Minds…’ competition.

Following the collaboration between MINI and Crayola to explore the creative minds of children and discover their visions for the cars of tomorrow, the winner of the ‘MINI Minds... with Crayola’ competition has been announced.

With hundreds of entries from across the UK by brilliant young visionaries aged 4 - 10, Oliver Gorrod, aged nine from Oxfordshire, has been unveiled as the winner. Oliver commented, “I can’t believe I have won! It was such a surprise and was so fun to enter as I love designing things.”

Praised for his remarkable creativity and future gazing prowess, his design centred around championing nature, with Oliver stating, “I like the idea of all cars being electric, as they are better for the environment, animals and the planet. My car is designed as camouflage, so it blends into natural environments.”

The competition inspired and fostered creative confidence in children, encouraging them to unleash their imaginations and design their dreams for the car of the future. As the generation growing up in a world dominated by electric cars, their entries unveiled some intriguing results, including over 25% saying they would like their car to be environmentally friendly to help the planet.

Oliver’s prize includes his winning design being made into reality using a vinyl wrap on a MINI Electric, plus a big bundle of Crayola art materials for him and his school. Oliver will also get to visit MINI Plant Oxford for a private tour, to see how the MINI Electric is made.

Federico Izzo, Director, MINI UK & Ireland said, “We’ve been truly inspired by the creativity displayed in the entries to our ‘MINI Minds… with Crayola’ competition.

Children are renowned for their boundless imagination, and this is evident in the ideas they have presented – we had entries which focused on being better for animals, boosting the mood of those around them, helping save the bees and plenty with a focus on sustainability - the creativity of the designs were fantastic. We are excited to bring Oliver’s design to life and hope he will continue to innovate and dream big in the future.”

Jade Childs, Marketing Controller at Crayola said, “Crayola is passionate about helping to raise creatively inspired children and seeing all the wonderful entries into the competition really demonstrated the children’s colourful originality and self-expression that, at Crayola’s core, we are all about unleashing. We are delighted to share Crayola art materials with Oliver and his class as part of the competition prize, and we hope they will continue to be inspired and express themselves as they explore, discover, play, pretend, and dream.