The Branson Auction, April 16-17, 2021
Branson Spring was six weeks after my second Coronavirus vaccination shot. After thirteen months huddled in front of computer screens viewing virtual auctions the trip was liberating. It wasn’t without trepidation that I set out, but Logan Airport in Boston was calm and organized. Masks were universal, if negligently worn by some. The American Airlines […]
Barrett-Jackson, Scottsdale 2021, March 23-27, 2021
This report is updated with full auction results and changes to some of the transactions. Don’t let something like Covid-19 interfere with a long-standing tradition like Barrett-Jackson’s Scottsdale auction. Just push it back two months as Covid-fatigue and vaccinations of older Americans (B-J’s primary market) opens up the gates to WestWorld for bidders and spectators. […]
RM Auctions, Online Only, Open Roads, March 24-25, 2021
RM Auctions is accelerating its Online Only auctions, on a path to conduct one a month in early 2021 between Scottsdale’s Live/Online auction and the upcoming late May Amelia Island auction. Expect more Online Only auctions between Amelia and Monterey. Recent RM Online Only auctions have introduced a new wrinkle: Auctions conducted in multiple currencies. […]
Bonhams Les Grandes Marques du Monde á Paris, March 10, 2021
No, it wasn’t at the Grand Palais des Champs-Élysées, it wasn’t during Rétromobile, nor in fact was it even in France. Les Grandes Marques du Monde á Paris was literally aethereal and online only. It also didn’t share the usual exceptional collection of rare, valuable and famous European cars and obscure French marques and models […]
RM Auctions, Open Roads, February, February 26-28, 2021
RM once again demonstrated the efficiency, efficacy and flexibility of its Online Only platform by conducting a three-day auction in three different currencies, Euros, Dollars and Swiss Francs. Looking at the success of Open Roads, February it is instructive to think back almost exactly a year to Amelia Island where the awful consequences of the […]
Bonhams “Legends of the Road” February 19, 2021
Bonhams “Legends of the Road” auction is a prime example of the flexibility and effectiveness of “pop-up” auctions in the CoViD era. There were only six lots, but several were exceptional and all had good stories to tell about collecting, preserving and driving. Bonhams, to their credit, produced a full printed and distributed catalog, something […]
RM Sotheby’s, “Paris” Online, February 13, 2021
With Rétromobile CoViD displaced to June, the Rétromobile week auctions were left to their own devices. RM Sotheby’s chose to rely on their established and efficient Online format with a 40-lot sale (plus automobilia). The cars were scattered across the Continent and the U.K., the later now formally divorced from the EU with all kinds […]
Mecum Auctions, Kissimmee, January 7-16, 2021
In the middle of a CoViD-19 resurgence Mecum Auctions went to Kissimmee for its annual extravaganza. Thousands of cars, thousands of people (although a lot fewer thousands than in 2020), live bidding and on-site previews. It was the Mecum auction formula, lightened up to cope with a pandemic. And it worked. Oh, how well it […]
Gooding & Company, European Sporting & Historic Collection, London, Geared Online, February 5, 2021
There were only nine lots in Gooding & Company’s February 5 “Geared Online” auction, styled the “European Sporting & Historic Collection”, but they were all very special lots. Whether it’s “Geared Online” from Gooding or “Online Only” from RM Sotheby’s the online format that CoViD has promoted lends itself to tightly structured limited consignment offerings. […]
Artcurial Motorcars, Parisienne, February 5, 2021
The annual pilgrimage to Paris, winter weather be damned, was put off this year by CoViD. The gigantic Rétromobile show months ago postponed to June 2-6 hoping to catch the CoViD slipstream – a hope that is increasingly ephemeral. The auctions that orbit Rétromobile from Artcurial Motorcars, Bonhams and RM Sotheby’s were left to follow […]