McLaren reveals M2B-inspired Silverstone livery with Google Gemini

McLaren turns to its roots for Silverstone

McLaren has unveiled a one-off British Grand Prix livery for Silverstone, drawing directly on the M2B, the car that marked the beginning of the team’s Formula 1 story.

Silverstone carries particular resonance in the story McLaren is choosing to tell. The team’s first Formula 1 car debuted at the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix, and that same year Bruce McLaren scored the team’s first championship point at Silverstone. For readers planning the race weekend, our British Grand Prix schedule guide has the key timings.

A tribute after Monaco celebrations

The reveal follows McLaren’s 1,000th Grand Prix celebrations in Monaco earlier this season, where two-time F1 drivers’ champion Mika Häkkinen drove the original M2B around the Circuit de Monaco. This Silverstone livery continues that same historical thread, but frames it through a contemporary partnership built around technology and performance.

Louise McEwen, McLaren Racing’s chief marketing officer, said: “Our Silverstone livery is a celebration of where we began and everything we have built since.”

She added: “The McLaren M2B represents the start of a journey defined by relentless innovation and a belief in possibility, and this design brings that spirit to life.”

McEwen also linked the project directly to the team’s work with Google Gemini, saying the partnership is rooted in shared principles of innovation, iteration and performance, both on and off track.

Gemini role extends beyond the livery

McLaren stressed that the collaboration is not limited to visual identity. The team said Gemini is already embedded in its operations, with Gemini Enterprise used to build tools that help trackside engineers search and compare sporting regulations during a race.

A natural language interface is also in development, aimed at drawing data from multiple systems at the same time.

Marvin Chow, vice president of consumer and AI marketing at Google, said: “From sparking creative ideas with the Gemini app to securely turning complex datasets into real-time trackside intelligence with Gemini Enterprise, McLaren is showing what it means to harness the power of AI.”

For McLaren, the Silverstone design is therefore more than a nostalgic paint scheme. It is a carefully positioned statement: honouring the M2B while using the British Grand Prix stage to underline where the team believes its next competitive edges may come from.