Held in and around an exclusive country club, the Salon Privé offers something different for the motor show enthusiast. Pat Holliday now reports.
The best way to enjoy a car is on a road, although the Salon Privé comes a close second. Forget the crowds, harsh lights and disinterested sales reps of a typical motor show - instead the latest and greatest from the world of performance and luxury motoring are displayed in the grounds of the Hurlingham Club in South West London. Beautiful country manor house, beautiful cars, beautiful people.
2010 is the fifth year of the event and this time around there are no premieres per se, but there's still plenty to excite. The atmosphere is strictly unhurried and access is complete. Want to sit in that Rolls-Royce Phantom? Go for it. Or how about the £350,000 Lexus LFA, which seems strangely crass in this setting? Even more so when a guest fires up the snarling V10 engine for kicks. The Veritas RS III is a return visitor, although since last year looks less of a silver arrow and more a complete single-seat racer.
Parked on the lawn next to the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG, Jaguar XKR and Morgan Aero SuperSports is... a Fiat 500, no less. Except it's not - the Atomik Cars 500 is the work of ex-Peugeot designer Jerome Gallix, who explains he was bored with conventional cars, so turned his hand to electric. His 500 actually shares little with the conventional car and is better thought of as a carbon fibre homage. With an electric motor front and back, all-wheel drive and 300bhp, it offers "supercar-like performance," he assures us. We believe you, Jerome.
Aston Martin has brought along the handsome new Rapide and DBS Volante, Maserati the GranCabrio, and Audi is out in force with an A8, new A1 city car and an R8 Spyder. With heavy downpours breaking out intermittently, the cabriolet roofs are staying decidedly UP.
The craftsmanship of Bentley never fails to impress, which at the Salon Privé is amply demonstrated by the new Mulsanne. The company's large saloon is one of those to which pictures simply do not do justice - in the metal it's a work of art. A high level of interest from show visitors suggests it hasn't gone unnoticed.
The Jaguar Heritage Museum has brought along a series of Jags to celebrate 75 years of the marque. The collection includes such seminals as a 1954 D-Type, MKII and an early SS100 of 1938. One of the more recent big cats - but no less unique - is an XKR from the Bond film 'Die Another Day', complete with rockets and Gatling Gun. Well, it'd be one way to placate your road rage...
This sort of collection highlights the long history of many exhibitors, and the links between old and new. Focus at the event this year is on "Maserati: The Orsi Era," the Italian industrialist who oversaw one of the more glorious periods of the trident marque. Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason is a contributor with his 250F of 1957 and 'Birdcage' Tipo 60. Zagato is beautifully represented with the A6G/54GT, a gorgeous coupe of 1956, one of just 20 ever built.
You'd expect the lawn to be wet underfoot, such is the drool-factor of the hypercar collection. Visitors admire the Ferrari F50, Jaguar XJ220, Bugatti EB 110 and even Rowan Atkinson's McLaren F1 - still a stunner after all these years. But causing great excitement - once the owner returns to pull the covers off - is a Panther 6 of 1977. Just two of these six-wheeled prototypes were ever built, both with an 8.2-litre Cadillac engine and an over-specced interior that included telephones in the door rest. Ostentatious? You bet.
The Panther is perfectly at home then, in a setting where ostentatiousness is both welcomed and celebrated. The aroma of barbequed lobster permeates the air, set to the rhtymic popping of corks and idle chit-chat of people enjoying themselves. It's almost impossible to do otherwise at the Salon Privé. |
