Lewis Hamilton, WhatsApp, and the Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 team have painted New York City green with the launch of a new race car emoji.
For two billion users on the instant messaging and voice over app, they can use the exclusive emoji, tied to WhatApp's popularity and the upcoming Miami Grand Prix from May 3-5. On Monday (April 29), Hamilton shut down Manhattan with a Formula One car demonstration alongside a life-sized replica of the emoji. Along with Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS team principal Toto Wolff, Hamilton also flipped the Empire State Building's lightswitch to a WhatsApp green, which included an animated projection of the emoji.
The British race car driver was also interviewed by Complex’s Ben Felderstein, where he spoke about the partnership and making his mark in the Big Apple.
Can you just talk about this WhatsApp Mercedes partnership and how it came to be?
Yeah. Well firstly, I mean, being here in New York, it's awesome. This is my favorite city and it's a great way of connecting and activating. We're doing Fifth Avenue tomorrow with a Formula One car. It's amazing to see the growth of our sport here in the States and how the Americans have really embraced, finally really taken on our sport as one of theirs. They're so passionate about all the sports, like NFL and NBA as such. And yeah, it's an incredible platform. Obviously I use it all the time, so it's my main way of communicating with my friends. So it was quite cool to hear them coming on board with the team position right on my nose and my helmet. I can't really remember not having WhatsApp. But it's interesting, there are people that I communicate with here in the States and they still don't use WhatsApp. So then this is the way I communicate. So then people start downloading it, communicate, and they're like, oh, how have I not had this my whole row? Right.
So you mentioned the growth of Formula One in the US and also Fifth Avenue in New York. What's it going to be like to shut down Fifth Avenue in New York City and race an F1 car down it?
I mean, I've only been down there once really before when I was much younger, but it's going to be nuts. I mean, it's such a busy location, perfect for shopping, so I can only imagine. I mean, as I said, I've not spent a lot of time down there, so I just remember home alone shopping down there. But yeah, locking it down in one of the business, tourist attractions I guess, of the city, it's going to be mad. I can only imagine there's going to be a huge amount of people there, so it'd be great exposure. People would be like, it's not that noise.
The Empire State Building as well, one of the most iconic landmarks in the entire world, you got to see your own advertisement on it, what did that feel like?
Well, I was hoping my face would go up there, but kidding. I think it was really cool to see it. I mean, obviously I saw Darth Vader on the side, and I was like, 'damn, that's cool.' I'm a big Star Wars fan. But yeah, to see it up there, I thought my eyes were playing with me when the building started moving and then seeing this little car pop up was really neat.
