Just a month after Historics’ previous Ascot auction, Saturday saw us return to the racecourse venue for their as-scheduled May 15th event, last month’s having been originally set for March 13th before being re-scheduled to April thanks to you-all-know-what. The previous sale was a great success, and it was always going to be difficult to emulate it this time around.
Despite the enforced close proximity of the two auctions, Historics’ consigners managed to pull in another strong line-up of cars and trucks. Attendance was still subject to Covid restrictions so even though this was the second public auction at the same venue in as many months, there was still an air of having been let out after school on what turned out, like much of the past few weeks, to be an unsettled Spring day. Fortunately, I’d already taken many photographs of the cars located outdoors on a dry preview day.
Historics usually attract a wide range of classics, and Saturday’s sale was no exception, with 164 lots across 47 marques available, ranging from a cute little 1967 FIAT 850, through to a brutal 2012 Aston Martin Zagato V8 Prototype. The little FIAT sold for £2,912, but the Zagato didn’t find a buyer, stalling at £510,000, or 175 FIAT 850’s…
From one extreme………to the other.
It is of course impossible in the space of a ViaRETRO article to mention each of the lots, but as usual, there were some that caught my eye for one reason or another. However I have to start with what might be the first time a car with no reserve failed to sell – certainly the first time I’ve seen it happen – though frankly, I’m not surprised that the first lot of the day, a 1994 Camaro covered in a thoroughly tasteless wrap failed to tempt a single bidder. Someone, somewhere might like it, but they weren’t at Ascot on Saturday. You might spot it in the gallery at the end…
Moving on to our two recently featured Prime Finds – the red 1971 Marcos GT 3000 and the Cashmere Gold 1978 Triumph TR7 convertible – the Marcos failed to find a buyer, stalling at £11,000 when £14,000 to £18,000 was expected, but the TR7, which looked exceptional, went for £17,920 – a good buy, I thought.
As usual, Jaguar and Mercedes-Benz were the most represented marques; 19 Jaguars were on offer, including a handful of superb early E–Types (although only two of which sold), and no fewer than 28 examples of the three-pointed star, among them a couple of beautifully restored Pagoda’s – which didn’t sell – as well as an unfinished, though almost complete, project 230SL which went for a staggering £94,080, almost three times its estimate. Biggest car on sale was unquestionably the imposing black 1971 600 Pullman, which got no further than £225,000, a long way from an estimate of £280,000 to £330,000. This enormous car was in fabulous shape and had an interior of unbridled luxury – a car for princes, presidents and potentates, but clearly there were none in the room, real or virtual, this day. If there were, and their budget couldn’t stretch (geddit?) to this immaculate limousine, a project 1969 SWB 600 was also available – it sold for £15,848 but will cost several times that to bring it close to the standard of the Pullman.
For those punters with deep pockets, there was plenty to spend your money on – besides the flat-floor E-Types and the 600 Pullman, a stunning 1958 Ferrari 250GT Pininfarina Coupé Series 1 in Blu Nart coachwork and with a Beige Conolly leather interior was up for sale. This beautiful mobile sculpture was estimated at £360,000 to £410,000, but it stalled at “just” £340,000. In terms of actual classic Astons, an exquisite metallic green 1960 DB4 fetched the day’s highest price, being sold “behind closed doors” for £385,000. The other star Aston, a handsome 1979 V8 Oscar India, didn’t manage to find a buyer.
A pair of project Alfa’s offered at no reserve attracted a lot of attention – both were former concours winners and had spent years in the same garage, stored there while the owner worked overseas. During that time, the Italian duo had suffered damage caused by a tree falling on and through the garage roof and onto the cars, which subsequently led to considerable deterioration but remained solid bases for restoration. The1960 Giulia SS went for £78,400 and the ’67 1600 Duetto for £35,092 – restored examples can make around £125,000 and £60,000 respectively, so there won’t be much margin for errors in the restoration work.
Staying with Italian marques, there was a gorgeous Lancia Flaminia GT – the auction catalogue’s cover star – in Lord Blue (a suitably grand colour for this grand coupé) with burnt orange hide. Restored between 2016 and 2018, this is a classic made for cruising around the Mediterranean and it looked wonderful, yet didn’t get past £63,000 against an estimates of £79,000 to £92,000 – very disappointing and surprising.
An equally glamorous Med-suitable Italian classic in the shape of a 1968 Maserati Quattroporte (sounds so exotic in Italian – Maserati Four Door just doesn’t have the same ring to it – was sold to a new owner for £59,996 against estimates of £45,000 to £55,000, and while this might seem a bargain next to the Flaminia, if it’s still too rich for your blood, how about another big Italian coupé, the FIAT 130 Coupé? With few exceptions, these elegant Pininfarina creations still rarely break the £30,000 barrier, and this silver example was no different, going for just £15,282 and while not in the same restored condition as the Lancia and Maser, it was in pretty reasonable shape – possibly the bargain of the day, for me.
From France, we had the oldest car of the day, a 1908 De Dion Bouton ready for the London-Brighton run, and which sold for an above-estimate £39,620, but perhaps the star Gallic attraction was the 1974 Alpine Renault A110 1600. This car had finished 3rd in its class and 23rd overall in the 1975 running of the Targa Florio, after which it was basically stored for 25 years. Since then, it’s been little used, and following recommissioning three years ago, this brilliant white A110 is ready to be raced again and sold for £105,000. One of those cars that looks fast standing still, I love these A110’s, but will never buy one even if I could, as I can’t fit behind the wheel without contorting myself into shapes I couldn’t manage even 40 years ago…I know, I tried…
More mundanely, a pristine little red Slovenian-built 1992 Renault 4L made a lovely entry-level classic at £9,056, and an intriguing 1967 Simca Aronde Plein Ciel, which unfortunately didn’t sell. The latter was an unfinished restoration project and parts may well be very hard to find for this Facel Vega-designed car (check the windows and roofline), perhaps a factor in its non-sale.
A French miscellany
There was some interesting Americana up for sale – a 1968 5.7-litre Chevrolet Camaro SS Convertible in Hugger Orange (it says here) with white centre stripes looked good, and fetched £31,000, while a 1970 Mustang Mach 1 in a fabulous metallic blue reached £31,696. A second, and in my view, better Mustang from 1965 with the 4.7-litre V8 went under the hammer for an above-estimate £51,520. I wouldn’t have said no to any of them.
Going back a little further, two handsome 1920’s saloons in the upright shapes of a two-tone brown and white 1928 Lincoln Model L Tourer with seats for seven, and a superb 1930 (well, it was introduced in the ‘20’s) Nash Ambassador 8 in metallic red and white looked like they’d just left the set of the Great Gatsby or maybe The Untouchables. The Nash found a buyer at £43,016, but the Lincoln remained unsold.
Another interesting US car was the black 1950 Chrysler Newport Town and Country, complete with woodwork. Only 698 were made and this was one of only two in the UK; it cost its new owner £36,224, and will make an impression wherever it goes.
One of the more unusual lots was a 1988 Vegantune (a name ahead of its time, clearly!) Evante Series 1. Taking quite a lot of, erm, “inspiration” from the Lotus Elan, particularly the front end, while the rear lights came from the TR7, just 106 were built in the Spalding, Lincolnshire factory between 1987 and 1991 – the company’s main business was engine manufacture – and this very tidy little two-seater found a new home for £11,872.
A couple of lots were back for a second time, the 1966 Buick Riviera succeeded in finding a new home on this occasion, as did the very good 1973 E9, the subject of over £100,000 expenditure and while it looked superb, still didn’t feel finished. The two went for £24,904 and £52,640 respectively, a big loss for the E9 owner, and I’m baffled as to why anyone would spend so much money on a car and then sell it.
What else? Well, there were four Porsche 928’s for sale, each one at a different level in 928 status – a 1983 928S, a 1987 S4, a 1991 GT and most desirable of all, a 1993 GTS, and the prices they fetched reflected their places in the 928 hierarchy, at £12,452, £28,300, £40,000 although the 928S4 didn’t sell. The 928 has dated extremely well to my eyes – the only thing wrong with it was that it wasn’t a 911, and it was a youngtimer 1998 911 Turbo S that was the day’s most expensive Porsche – indeed, the sale’s second most expensive car – going under the hammer for a within estimate £279,000. One of just 26 RHD examples, it was stunning in Guards Red.
There weren’t so many cars with famous owners this time around, although a lovely 1970 Rolls Royce Shadow 2-door had a pre-knighthood Richard Attenborough as its first owner fetched £61,500, and former Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman’s old Mercedes 250S from 1966 – the year the Stones released 19th Nervous Breakdown and Paint It Black, so I imagine he could easily afford it; it sold for a satisfactory (yes, I made that pun) £20,942.
In terms of the numbers, this sale didn’t quite match up to the excellent results achieved at last month’s auction, which was always unlikely, and I think it would be fair to describe the day as a mixed-to-good bag overall – the auctioneers had to work hard for their commission, and they will have been disappointed with the performance of some of the high-end lots, few of which sold, and which obviously have the biggest impact on their own revenues. As of Monday afternoon, the numbers looked like this:-
Cars sold with No Reserve – 36 or 22%
Cars sold below estimate – 18 or 11%
Cars sold within estimate – 39 or 24%
Cars sold above estimate – 30 or 18%
Not sold – 41 or 25%
123 sales out of 164 cars and trucks, or a sale rate of 75% – not too shabby, and just one or two of the more prestigious lots being sold would have surely made a substantial difference. Least expensive car of the day was a 2001 MG Rover ZS180– selling for just £1,680, while the aforementioned DB4 was the priciest, and as always with Historics’ sales, an interesting and varied day – below are just some of the other cars that were on offer.
