If you could concoct your dream concours d’elegance, how would it look? Naturally, the location is of paramount importance – we’d prefer somewhere sunny, obviously, but also a destination in which one wouldn’t get bored spending a day or two either side of the main event. Cars are, of course, a must, but we’d settle for a smaller, higher quality and more diverse selection of, say, 25 that really reflect the event’s location.
Twenty-three outright victories. Forty-four podium finishes. Seventy thousand racing kilometres, across five continents. Fourteen hundred hours of restoration. In a discreet warehouse on the industrial outskirts of Turin resides one of the broadest and most historically significant collections of ex-Works rally and post-War GT cars in the world, assembled over the course of two decades by the late Luigi ‘Gino’ Macaluso.
The Meyers Manx Dune Buggy is so much more than the sum of its modest, predominantly VW-sourced parts. It’s a symbol of beach-born bohemian freedom, which admittedly we haven’t experienced a lot of so far this year. Thanks, Covid-19.
Handcrafted in the Netherlands and powered by a 400HP Audi-sourced V8, the Spyker C8 Laviolette is an aeronautic-inspired supercar ideal for the enthusiast who’d prefer to tread his own path than follow the herd.
This particular example, one of the last built before production ceased in 2008 amid the company’s financial turmoil, is teeming with wonderful, intricate details such as the 19-inch propeller-like wheels, sumptuous diamond-quilted Tropicana Orange leather and beautiful knurled aluminium trim.
Agreed, we all love our Porsche 911s and Jaguar E-types, but if you really want to stand out from the collector car crowd this summer, we suggest plumping for something less classic and more, um, curious. Currently, RM Sotheby’s is selling a hoard of European cars from the Petitjean Collection, online and entirely without reserve.