If Mitch Lanzini’s smiling face looks familiar, it should. In fact, you may have spent hours with him already.  He appeared in over 25 episodes of the Overhaulin’ TV show. While completing a custom in a week is not something he’d recommend for the daily grind, he is proud of the work he accomplished on the show. “When you have the pressure on, it’s amazing what you can get done,” he says.  

Like many in the business, Mitch’s love for all things automotive started in childhood. He collected Hot Wheels and built model cars for contests.
When he was a little older, he painted bicycles and flamed motorcycles. Things took off from there. He earned his first cover in 1982 with a full custom Datsun pickup for Mini-Truck magazine. Tara, Mitch’s wife, shares his life-long passion for cars, and together they opened Lanzini Body Works in 1993.

At Lanzini Body Works, there’s always a custom project going on, but collision work is their bread and butter. “I treat it the same as a custom job. And I
use the best that PPG has to offer,” says Mitch, who is the shop’s lead painter. He stocks his shelves with the ENVIROBASE® High Performance
waterborne base coat system. “There’s no dieback. I’m doing more cars in a day. And the support I get from PPG is outstanding.”

Mitch is taking in more and more specialty painting projects as well, which fulfills his passion for expressive painting. He has done commissions
for surfboards, aircraft interiors, modern art displays and quick turn around prototypes. He has also painted a custom line of skateboard and roller-skating wheels. “I’m excited by painting things that aren’t cars. Something that’s strange, that’s different, that’s weird.”

Using an automotive paint on this wide array of non-automotive objects isn’t as counter intuitive as some may think. Mitch points out that Fender®
used car paint to finish its guitars as far back as the ‘50s and ‘60s. He says the Envirobase High Performance system and its latex technology works especially well for these projects. “The toners are very vibrant and bright,” he explains. “When blending in a flame, it’s so clean, so perfect. It’s not big droplets, it’s nice, fine droplets.” They never know what the next big project will be at Lanzini Body Works. But no matter if it’s a one-off custom,
collision repair or a cutting-edge piece of art, one thing is for certain— Mitch will always stick with a proven performer. “The last thing I paint will
be PPG,” he says.