A preservation class car won a major international concours for the first time when a 1932 Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 Figoni took Best of Show at Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este (24-26 May). The car, which had previously made the final four at Pebble Beach, is owned by the HM Collection and was represented by Fiskens.
The award was handed over at Villa Erba on the Sunday by Helmut Käs, head of BMW Group Classic and president of the Concorso d‘Eleganza Villa d´Este, and Wilhelm Schmid, CEO of A. Lange & Söhne.
There was another shock in the Coppo d’Oro, the award voted for by the public, when visitors to Villa d’Este picked a relatively modern McLaren F1 over the other 40 or so priceless beauties on the shores of Lake Como. This example had been bought new by the owner of Ueno Clinic, which sponsored the McLaren F1 team that won the 1995 Le Mans 24 Hours.
Although there aren’t a huge number of cars in the concours they are all of exceptional quality. This year they included Lord Bamford’s stunning 1933 Rolls-Royce Phantom II, Corrado Lopresto’s 1923 Diatto Tipo 20S, Nicholas and Shelley Schorsch’s 1927 Isotta Fraschini and Christoph Zeiss’s 1938 Lagonda V12 Rapide.
Post-war highlights included Brian Ross’s 1957 Ferrari 335 S, William Heinecke’s 1962 Ferrari 250 GT Speciale Aerodinamico, Jonathan and Wendy Segal’s Maserati A6GCS/53 Spider Frua and Roberto Quiroz’s 1956 Maserati A6G/54 Zagato.
