Elegance and Automobile in Monte Carlo

To give you some idea of what the Concours was like back in the early 1930’s, I have discovered this photograph. The cars are driving round in front of the Monaco Casino which has not changed since, but today the Café de Paris fills up the space in the foreground.

To commemorate the 70th Anniversary of the first post-WWII Le Mans 24 hour race in 1949 there were three 166 models, including the actual Luigi Chinetti/ Lord Selsdon 166 MM race winner (Chassis 0008), which was brought by Anne Brockington Lee. It still carries its Le Mans winning race numbers.

Next to it stood another interesting 166MM,(Chassis 0064) the dark blue and green car originally bought by Fiat supremo Gianni Agnelli in 1950 and now owned by Londoner Clive Beecham.

The earliest of the three 166MMs was chassis 006, brought from the USA by Brian and Kimberly Ross, a car which is rarely seen.

A car that truly rocked me back on my heels was the green Maserati V4 spyder with coachwork by Zagato. The car was one of only two V4’s built by the factory. You might be thinking that V4 meant a four cylinder but in fact it was one of the most fascinating engines produced by Maserati, as it was a 16 cylinder 4 liter with two 8 engines based on the 26B, mounted side by side with a single crankcase!

Alfieri Maserati drove V4, chassis 4001, in the Italian Grand Prix at Monza in 1930 and was to beat the World Speed record at Cremona shortly afterward. But it was not a success, and the car returned to the factory only to be renumbered 5001, and was the basis of the later Maserati V5. At the end of 1930, however, Professor Riccardo Galeazzi persuaded Maserati to build chassis 4002 into a sports car which was clothed by Zagato. It was this car that appeared at Monaco and is owned by Lawrence Auriana.

How about this interesting 6C Alfa Romeo Mille Miglia coupe of 1931, entered by Jakob Braam Ruben from Holland with early coachbuilt body by Touring…

…or the even more interesting 1934 Lancia Astura “Aerodinamico” with Castagna coachwork which may not look “Aerodinamico” from the front, but take a look at the back with its vestigial tail fin. Now owned by Antonious Meijer from Holland.

…but take a look at the back with its vestigial tail fin. Now owned by Antonius ‘Ton’ Meijer and his wife Maya.

I have always liked the Fiat 8V and will be writing more about it in a future issue of VeloceToday, but this one was in superb concours condition. It is an early Berlinetta with the original production nose trim, but no side lights on top of the wings. It was in better than new condition and was spectacular in Italian racing red.

The oldest car in the Concours was something truly special. It was a 1914 Mercedes 28/95 Phaeton, brought by Anke Rueckwarth from Germany. Note the massive artillery wheels and the beautiful patina on the wood panelling. The coachbuilding was done at Mercedes’ own company in Sindelfingen, and the car featured a massive in-line six-cylinder engine of 7.2 liters. It was the first Mercedes to be fitted with an overhead camshaft.

After WW1, Mercedes became Mercedes-Benz and in 1928 they produced this stunning 680S Torpedo, with bodywork by Erdmann & Rossi. This car also had a 7 liter straight-six engine, but at 180 bhp produced double the horsepower of the 28/95. This car too, was brought from Germany and is owned by Niklas and Sonja Maier.

One of the cars with royal connections was the Ferrari 250GT Europa with a Vignale body brought from Mexico by Jamie and Cecelia Muldoon. It was formerly owned by Princess Lilian de Rethy, the second wife of King Leopold of Belgium. With its white roof and dark green colour, it stood out as an elegant representative of the 250GTs of that period.

No show is complete without a Spanish Pegaso, which created a storm in the 1950s as the kind of McLaren of its day. The one on show in Monaco was a 1954 Z-102 Cabriolet with the typical flamboyant styling by Saoutchik in Paris.

However, if you preferred the remarkable styling of some of the show cars in more recent times you could marvel at one of the true styling gems, Jim Glickenhaus’ white Ferrari 512S Modulo, with coachwork by Pininfarina, introduced in 1970. This slippery shaped gem, however, was to suffer a problem on the second day when on the road run near Monaco the car caught fire. It was quickly extinguished but left a burn mark on the tail as can be seen in the photo. The way in and out of the car is also rather special.

Standing next to it was another of those iconic show cars, this time styled by Marcello Gandini at Bertone. Indeed, it was the first Lancia to be styled by Bertone, and it was first shown at the 1970 Turin Motor Show. Meanwhile Gandini was working on another prototype which was shown at Turin the following year and this was the prototype for the fantastic Lancia Stratos. The 1970 car at Monaco is owned by Philip Sarofim and featured Gandini’s wedge shaped front.

…but look at it from the rear and the sheer artistry of the car is exposed.

We all know that Ferruccio Lamborghini fell out with Ferrari and decided to build his own car. This is an early 1965 350 GTZ. He had Zagato build the body on the standard 350 GT chassis, but it is probably co-incidence that it looks very much like the Ferrari GTO. This car, owned by William Pope, coming straight from Japan, where it had won Best of Show at the Kyoto Concorso d’Eleganza.

Probably the daddy of all the pre-war Mercedes luxury sports cars was the supercharged 540K. This 1936 example was styled and built at Mercedes’ Sindelfingen plant.

Then there was the Stout Scarab from 1936, a truly iconic model designed and built by William Bushnell Stout, who captured the design escapism of the 1930s with his idea of an engine in the rear driving the rear wheels so as to release the maximum space for passengers and luggage. Stout was quite a character who was fascinated by aerodynamics, which was not surprising as he had designed the prototype for the Ford Tri-Motor aeroplane.

Finally, there are three cars which were, to my mind, the stars of the show, and I can assure you the fact that two of the owners are old friends had nothing to do with my choice: but you decide. The first, was Sir Michael Kadoorie’s stunning 1939 Talbot-Lago T150C SS with coachwork by the lesser known Pourtout company in Paris. Its flowing lines were the fashion of the day.

This detail shot of the other Talbot-Lago T150 C SS cabrio demonstrates another superb example of the genre, this time the styling is by Figoni & Falaschi.

However, my personal prize goes to an Alfa Romeo that I found totally awe-inspiring. The coachwork was not by a French company but by Pinin Farina in 1939, nine years after Batista “Pinin” Farina broke away from the family coachbuilding company that was Farina.

From the front, it has style with lots of detail highlights, but from the rear three-quarter view, we have a magnificent interpretation of the flamboyant 1930’s style which was to fade away with the arrival of WWII, just months after this car was built.