Jive-Bomber submitted a new blog post: Judging the Orphans... Continue reading the Original Blog Post
That is a very nice honor. Amelia Island is on my bucket list for sure. It is only a 6 hour drive but a world away in quality of cars!
From wild to crazy styling I have always enjoyed the future vision of the desingers that were designers and not commettees. Please share these treasures with the rest of us without Golden Invitations.
The Italia always struck me as one of the ugliest cars ever designed. A frumpy silhouette plastered with every hunk of gook they they could find, thrown on with no regard to function or aesthetics. The height of what a Packard executive called the "lunar asparagus" school of design. If Hudson wasn't already dead this heap would have finished them off.
Very nice honor. I admire the fact that you're taking this very serious (as should be) and you have my wish that it will be a educational and enjoyable experience. Maybe you will be able to report back with your experience?
Congratulations! That is quite an honor and privilege.....and I am sure you will enjoy it to the fullest. Styling Study cars were tangible manifestations of the designer's imaginations....free thinking exercises ....seldom intended to have completely practical application for production. Yes, some were..ahhh...less attractive than others. However they did inspire many themes and styling cues that were quite successfully adopted for production models. Looking forward to your followup article. Ray
Have to agree with this. Way too much going on, the antithesis of subtle, sublime style. But love the category, and the other two cars are plenty cool. That Merc redefines Dagmar. Good on ya, Jay! They got themselves a serious car guy. The HAMB represented at Amelia! Too cool.
What an honor! Congrats to you Sir. Sounds as though you are taking it quite seriously, now get to studying! Plenty of pics please.
Man, you have just stepped outside my comfort zone. I'm not sure I could be a judge for such a prestigious event. Good luck and do your homework because these ain't your run of the mill automobiles. HRP
It'd be interesting judging these cars as many concepts were originally just thrown together, some even without drivetrains. Look forward to seeing what your experience is at this event.
Wow. How cool is that. I believe that would be the only class I would be interested in too. It would be fun to do all the investigative work prior to the judging. I bet you'll shine. Congratulations!!
That is too cool. Im thinking it wouldn't be an easy job, and it looks like your doing your homework first. Congratulations.
Most of those cars were quite well built, actually. It was some of the later cars that were purely styling exercises. In the blog post, the photo of the Desoto Adventurer II shows it with the 1954 Dodge Firearrow III concept (the blue/green car on the right). That car actually set a few closed course speed records at the time with a woman driver. She ran 145mph or something like that, but the craziest thing is she did it in high heels. I always thought that was funny. My dad did some restoration work on that car a few years ago. They also did work on a few other Ghia-bodied cars, like the Dual Ghia, the L6.4, and yes - an Italia. The details on these cars are simply incredible. Jive-Bomber, you're in for a treat. We expect pictures!
Man, that sounds like fun! Jangleguy [my brother] and I attended the Pebble beach concours in 2012 and the theme was post war homemade American sports cars. Curtis', Allards Muntz etc etc etc....some very nice "concours" restorations with Olds, caddy, chryser hemi and flathead engines in them....and flathead 6's in the Nash Healeys. All nice stuff.
Congrads, that's such a cool and unique thing to be invited to do. That XM-800 is pretty awesome, and such a great snapshot of the styling of the time.
Nash Healeys used a 240 cu in OHV Nash six with 7 main bearings, an excellent engine. Good enough to finish in the money at LeMans against the best sports cars in the world.
Assuming all other aspects are of equal quality, the Merc wins hands down for the styling. Not even sure why that one is even considered an "orphan".
As a concept design car, it would most likely be hard to judge it as a normally classified car. If your judging on "production correct" details, it would be tough to judge a one off hand built car. Probably didn't have any other class to put it in.
Congrats Jay, should be a fun time. Funny kind of related. I have a friend with a 50's Jaguar 140 (?) coupe, not roadster but a very beautiful coupe that is very restored. He enters some of the concours stuff, but he is the *only* one that drives his car there. Everyone else is trailered. He gets there, cleans his up and then has fun looking at the other cars. He rarely wins of course with his driver car, as he says "it's not who you know, it's who you blow". He is not into the ass-kissing, and driving the car is where he gets the fun.
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