The photo of Ruzzin on the left is circa 1996. Facing page is a sample of Ruzzin’s studio drawings all of which—and more—illustrate the book along with GM images of some of the cars and people of whom Ruzzin writes.
Designing Dreams
by Dick Ruzzin
Reviewed by Helen V Hutchings
Key Dick Ruzzin’s name into the search engine of this site and watch how many pages and stories come up for Ruzzin has been a frequent contributor over the years.
Consider for just a moment; we all have had experiences with many of them fodder worthy of being included in written remembrances. But everyone isn’t interested or willing to try to put those remembered experiences into something that can be shared with others in printed form. As you can see, Dick Ruzzin is one of those who happily shares experiences as he recalls them from his career within GM’s Design function where he was employed from the earliest 1960s to just after the Millennium.
This Designing Dreams is Ruzzin’s second book. The first he self-published in 2016 using Xlibiris. As Gary has told you about on this site, Bella Mangusta was a show and tell of one of Dick’s treasured cars: the only Mangusta ever built by the factory fitted with a hand-built 350 hp LT79 Corvette engine the construction of which had been overseen by Zora himself. The car to be fitted with the specified engine had been ordered by then VP of Design, Bill Mitchell. Once assembled, the engine was shipped to the DeTomaso factory along with the adapter plate needed to mate it to the standard Mangusta ZF five-speed transaxle. Dick has owned and cared for the car since 1969.
Between that book and submissions to this site and other places, Dick has reminisced on a variety of topics. Now many of those previous works (essays as the subtitle indicates) have been compiled but not just randomly. As the Table of Contents shows, they were organized to be able to tell an “Inside story of General Motors, Harley Earl and America’s Golden Automotive Age” via a manuscript Dick submitted to a publisher in the UK. Veloce proved to be right choice for Ruzzin and so this hardbound, nicely produced book has become a reality, It even has that nice touch of a ribbon marker bound in that is toned to match the turquoise of the LeSabre concept car on the cover and the thin surrounding border.
At the core of the book are Ruzzin’s recollections from being part of the group that worked on the 1966 Toronado’s design under the direction of Oldsmobile’s Chief Designer Stan Wilen, whom he also profiles as well as another profile of Olds’ Chief Engineer at the time, John Beltz. Prior to the Toronado chapters, Ruzzin sets the stage, as it were, by sharing his own background and explaining the design process from his perspective and some of his experiences over the nearly 40-year career as part of GM’s Design Staff.
Although Veloce is located in Britain, as an imprint of David and Charles, Ltd, it has global distribution. Thus customs and long distance shipping can be avoided by simply visiting your favorite local bookstore. Armed with the ISBN and title a copy can be ordered and provided without the long delays and charges associated with international shipping, exchange rates and the like.
Title: Designing Dreams
Subtitle: Essays on the inside story of General Motors, Harley Earl and America’s Golden Automotive Age
Author: Dick Ruzzin
Description: 176 pages, 8.4” x 10” hardbound, 42 b/w & 64 color illustrations, indexed
ISBN: 978 1 8364 4001 7
Publisher: Veloce imprint of David and Charles Ltd, 2025 Veloce.co.uk
List Price: $29.99 £24.99
Just purchased the book from Target, looking forward to reading the book. Thanks!
Looking forward to reading this!
I received my copy today, and I highly recommend it!
Thank you very much for the nice review. And for the support of my first book, Bella Mangusta, the Italian Art and Design of the De Tomaso Mangusta. That book is a very narrow opportunity of interest, but I meet people often who have it and really enjoyed it.
I started Designing Dreams off as a story about the Toronado design program, the result of a special request by Steven Wilen, the son of Stan Wilen, who was the Chief Designer responsible for the design of the 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado. Steven kept saying you have to do a book, as the story got bigger and bigger. But, It just wasn’t big enough for a book, so I started looking around at what else I had written that I might include with it. I put that together, over a period of a couple of months, added what was missing and then looked around for a possible PUBLISHER. I very quickly landed on DAVID and CHARLES Ltd; they had been previously called Veloce.UK. They wanted to do the book and sell it worldwide, so I sent them everything I had and they started the editing. I added a few things and was quickly told, fine. OK that’s it. Don’t send anymore. We are all set.
After a couple of weeks, thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that the book was not really about the Toronado design, even though it was in there in great detail. It was about something much bigger and that was the creation of the profession of car design by Harley Earl and the impact that it had on the world. So I wrote a new introduction to the book, which was several pages, sent that to the editor and received a thumbs up in return immediately.
By changing the focus of the book description it was my intention to increase the interest and broaden it’s appeal. The result was that the price was cut in half, as many more sales are expected.
In some ways, the book is a pay payback for all of the people that I worked with who helped me in many ways, designing cars through the years.
After reviewing the book before production, I sent the editor a message that they had given me back more than I gave them. I meant that, sincerely. I am delighted with the quality of the book, as well as the aesthetics. Of course it isn’t perfect in my eyes, but after being involved in so many different car programs, I understand that really doesn’t happen very often. Although I have to say that there was never any car that I worked on that was disappointing.
I’m especially impressed with the price of $29.95, and I truly believe that for that, it is really a bargain in many ways. None of the book reviews touched on the intellectual side of the automobile design process that is clearly presented. That was done over a number of years and I was able to express those statements clearly.
I’m happy that the message is out there, it’s the first time anything like this has been done and very likely it will not be repeated. Harley Earl created the profession of car design. How he did it had to be a great challenge, That is in the book and much of what is written there was realized by myself years later, after retiring from General Motors Design, the book is not about what happened, it is about how it happened.
Thanks to everyone who has purchased Designing Dreams, I am confident that you will enjoy it.
Thank you again for the wonderful book review that appears on deansgarage.com. I read it again this morning and it is absolutely the best of many that I have received. It appears as though Helen really read the book and really understood what was in there.
Her commentary is excellent, as well as her comments about Bella Mangusta. She somehow seems to be able to get to the very core of the subject that is presented.
Thank you again also Gary for publishing all my comments throughout the years.