It featured a mid-engined layout of a donor racing car chassis and three-seat arrangement with a central driving position, as later popularised with the McLaren F1.

The development of a mid-engine, road-going sports car was inevitable and Pininfarina built three Ferrari-based prototypes to be at the forefront of this revolution.

Up to this point Enzo Ferrari steadfastly refused to create a road-going car with a V12 engine in the mid-rear position and to involve an untraditional design language.

[6] Had Ferrari built it, nobody would ever have given a second thought to the Miura Luigi "Coco" Chinetti Junior[7] The exterior design was loosely based on the existing road-going Dino concept, already sporting a mid-engine layout and presented just a year earlier, in 1965.

Aldo Brovarone as Pininfarina's soon to be Head of Styling and creator of all the road-going Dino exterior designs, is also credited with the Berlinetta Speciale.

Overall side profile and details like a visible fuel cap and tear shaped air vents were similar to the Dino counterparts.

[9][11] Completed in September 1966 and finished in Garenia White, the first example was presented in October of the same year at the Paris Motor Show on the Pininfarina stand.

The car was delivered with a large, chromed rear spoiler and with fabric covered seats and during its lifetime was repainted in metallic blue and then red.

[6][10] The 365P is powered by a race-oriented variant of the Colombo 60° V12 engine, carried over from the Ferrari 365 P2, with SOHC valvetrain actuating two valves per cylinder.

[15] Fuel was fed by three Weber 40DFI carburettors and with a compression ratio of 8.8:1 the resulting power output was 380 PS (279 kW; 375 hp) at 7,300 rpm.

[16] The mid-engine, tubular competition chassis was similar to that of Ferrari 330 P2 and was in fact borowed from the 365 P2 customer version, the same as used by Luigi Chinetti's NART team in 1965, with addition of a roll bar and cast aluminium wheels.

[16] The car uses independent suspension front and rear, with unequal-length wishbones, coil springs, telescopic shock absorbers with anti-roll bars.