Slade Stewart and Andy Lee are inviting supporters to redesign one of the most recognizable cars in the GT World Challenge America paddock, with the winning livery set to appear on the No. 14 Riley Motorsports BMW M4 GT3 EVO at the Indianapolis 8 Hour.
Most racing liveries begin with a design brief, a collection of sponsor requirements and a carefully controlled approval process.
Sparklefarts began with something far more personal.
Originally created by Slade Stewart’s children, the bright pink unicorn design developed an identity that stretched well beyond its bodywork. What began in Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America became an unmistakable part of Stewart’s racing program, remembered as much for its personality as for the cars carrying it.
That identity has continued into 2026 as Stewart and Andy Lee contest the Pro-Am category of GT World Challenge America powered by AWS with Riley Motorsports. The familiar pink unicorn now covers the No. 14 BMW M4 GT3 EVO, carrying a family-created idea onto one of the most advanced GT racing platforms competing in North America.
For the final round of the season, however, the car will carry a new interpretation.
A Familiar Car, Reimagined
Stewart and Lee have opened the design process to the people who have followed Sparklefarts from the grandstands, paddock and online.
The 2026 Sparklefarts Livery Contest invites fans to create an original design for the No. 14 BMW. Once submissions close, the eligible entries will go to a public vote, giving supporters the opportunity to help select the winning design.
That artwork will then move from a two-dimensional template onto the full-scale race car for the Indianapolis 8 Hour.
It is an unusual exchange between a racing program and its audience. Here, fans are being invited not only to create the livery itself, but also to help decide through a public vote which design reaches the race car.
That approach feels particularly appropriate for Sparklefarts. Its identity was never conceived by a conventional motorsport design department. It came from within Stewart’s family, retaining a sense of imagination that has remained visible through changes of championship, team and machinery.
The competition now extends that same creative freedom to a much wider community.
From Paper to the Paddock
Entrants can download the official BMW M4 GT3 template through the Stewart Motorsports website and develop their design by hand, either on paper or through original digital illustration.
The rules are deliberate. Every submission must be original artwork created by the entrant. Artificial intelligence-generated designs are prohibited, and organizers may request the original project file to verify how a digital entry was produced. Each design must also remain clean and family-friendly, preserving the approachable character that has helped define the car.
Once approved, submitted artwork can be rendered onto a digital version of the BMW, allowing its creator to see how the design translates from a flat template to the complex surfaces of a GT3 car.
The entries already displayed by Stewart Motorsports demonstrate how widely the competition has reached. Designs have arrived from children, teenagers and adults, with contributors represented across the United States as well as Colombia and Germany.
Each artist begins with the same outline, yet the bodywork becomes something different in every set of hands. Colors move across the doors, patterns wrap around the wheel arches and individual ideas reshape a car whose identity is already firmly established.
More Than a Change of Color
In modern motorsport, a livery carries much of a team’s public identity. It must remain recognizable at speed, distinguishable within a crowded field and adaptable across photography, broadcasting and digital media.
Sparklefarts already accomplishes those things. The pink BMW is difficult to mistake for anything else in the GT World Challenge America paddock.
The contest is therefore not simply an invitation to change its colors. It asks entrants to reinterpret an established character without losing the personality that made it recognizable in the first place.
For Stewart and Lee, the winning design will place a supporter’s work at the center of their most demanding race of the year. For the artist, it offers something rarely available outside professional motorsport: the opportunity to see an original drawing transformed into a working racing livery and carried through an eight-hour international GT event.
It also reflects the relationship that has formed around the car. Sparklefarts has never relied on restraint to be noticed. Its bright colors and unicorn imagery stand apart from the serious visual language commonly associated with GT3 racing, yet that contrast is precisely what has made it memorable.
Behind the playful exterior remains a professional racing program, an experienced driver pairing and a BMW M4 GT3 EVO prepared to compete at the highest level of North American GT racing.
The livery does not diminish that purpose. It gives it an identity.
Continue Reading
- Brandon Gdovic’s Lamborghini With Purpose
- Chicago Performance’s Lamborghini Identity
- Three Standout Liveries at Laguna Seca
The Road to Indianapolis
Submissions close on September 14, 2026. The eligible entries will then go to a public vote, with supporters helping to choose the winning design.
That livery will appear on the No. 14 Riley Motorsports BMW M4 GT3 EVO during the Indianapolis 8 Hour weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, scheduled for October 8–10.
By then, the winning artwork will have moved through several very different environments: from a blank template, through the selection process and finally onto the surface of a GT3 car preparing for the longest race on the GT World Challenge America calendar.
Sparklefarts began as a reminder that motorsport does not always need to take itself too seriously. Its next chapter will preserve that spirit while giving someone outside the cockpit and garage an uncommon place within the team’s season.
At Indianapolis, one fan’s drawing will no longer exist only on paper.
It will become part of the race.
Bring Your Story Into Focus
Commission race-weekend reporting, documentary photography or image licensing from Speed & Spirit Media.
Continue exploring: Motorsport stories · Event coverage · About Speed & Spirit Media