What is the name of the Italian aircraft designer in The Wind Rises?

The Italian aircraft designer in The Wind Rises is Giovanni Battista Caproni. The film presents him as Jiro Horikoshi’s inspirational idol and recurring companion in dream sequences.

Caproni was a real Italian aeronautical, civil, and electrical engineer who founded the Caproni aircraft company. Born in 1886, he designed aircraft ranging from early biplanes to large multi-engined machines. His experimental Caproni Ca.60, a nine-wing flying boat intended to carry 100 passengers, appears prominently in Jiro’s dreams, although the real aircraft crashed during its second flight in 1921.

The film blends history with fiction. Jiro Horikoshi was a real Japanese aircraft designer, and Caproni was a real contemporary figure, but their personal conversations and shared dream world are imaginative. Caproni tells Jiro that building beautiful aircraft matters more than simply flying them, a theme that echoes Jiro’s lifelong ambitions.

Igor Sikorsky, Willy Messerschmitt, and Hugo Junkers were also real aviation pioneers, but none is the Italian designer portrayed in the film.