Bonhams, Quail Lodge, August 15-16, 2019
More is not Better Bonhams crammed 219 cars into its Quail Lodge location in 2019, 62% more lots in exactly the same space at a sale where when Bonhams previously has expanded to two days it has been to feature a high-profile collection. They were cheek by jowl tight. The Maserati Bora lost its right […]
The 2019 Monterey Auctions
By now it’s pretty well-known that the collector car auctions in Monterey were off by nearly a third from last year. It’s taken some time to get consistent results from the auction companies, then to put them into a coherent presentation that is comparable with prior years. The week itself was a marathon culminating in […]
Barrett-Jackson Northeast, Mohegan Sun Casino & Resort, June 27-29, 2019
With 548 vehicles crossing the block at Barrett-Jackson’s fourth annual auction at the Mohegan Sun Casino & Resort in Uncasville, Connecticut it is reasonable to infer there’s lots of fodder for collector car auction reports. That was hardly the case in 2019 (or, for that matter, in prior years.) First, let’s consider what a “collector […]
Bonhams, Festival of Speed, Goodwood, July 5, 2019 (Updated July 19)
Since no one in his or her right mind who loves cars needs an excuse to attend the Goodwood Festival of Speed the FoS is more like an excuse to attend Bonhams auction. This is never a big auction, more like a place for the right crowd to gather away from the sensory overload of […]
Bonhams, Greenwich Concours, June 2, 2019
Weather, sometimes the bane of the Greenwich Concours d’Elegance, cooperated in magnificent fashion this year with three days of glorious sunshine complemented by cooling breezes off Greenwich Harbor. It gave the Concours the perfect opportunity to show off its unusual two-day event, taking full advantage of the limited space in Roger Sherman Baldwin Park by […]
Mecum Auctions, Spring Classic State Fairgrounds, Indianapolis, May 15-19, 2019 Part II: Ford Thunderbird through Volkswagen
Let the introduction to Part I suffice, these are the rest of the cars, including the ’57 Ford F-birds. But a comment is in order. Mecum loaded the Spring Classic with ’57 T-birds, 24 of them in all, not to mention ’55 and ’56 T-birds. The sell-through was disappointing, just 14 of the 24 57’s, […]
Mecum Auctions, Spring Classic State Fairgrounds, Indianapolis, May 15-19, 2019 Part I: AM General through Ford Mustang
There were five of us on the ground at Mecum’s Spring Classic with the result that 238 of the 1,123 vehicles offered were described in detail. Put in literal terms, that’s about 37,571 words of content, about the same as a 150 page trade paperback novel. Now, a quarter to a third of it is […]
Bonhams, Tupelo Automobile Museum, April 26-27, 2019
Collectors have been “aging-out” of collecting for decades. Sometimes it is voluntary, other times it is not. Occasionally there are sequential dispositions (viz., Dick Burdick, Larry Klairmont and Michael Dingman, as in, “sell, collect anew, sell again.”) On April 26-27 in Tupelo, MS (“Birthplace of Elvis Presley”) Bonhams dispersed Frank and Jane Spain’s Tupelo Automobile […]
RM Sotheby’s, Fred Guyton Collection, St. Louis, Missouri, May 4-5, 2019
RM Sotheby’s sale of Fred Guyton’s collection in St. Louis was the second time in two weeks that a large collection was sold out to the bare walls. The collections were markedly different in concept from last week’s sale of engineer Frank Spain’s Tupelo Automobile Museum. Fred Guyton was an architect with, based upon the […]
Barrett-Jackson, Palm Beach, Florida, April 11-13, 2019
2019 marked Barrett-Jackson’s fifteenth year at the South Florida Fairgrounds in West Palm Beach. It may have been fifteen years, but that doesn’t mean it is “the same old thing” as B-J loaded the docket with late model supercars and finely crafted Restomods and customs in 2019. The top sale was a ’47 Buick Restomod […]