Affordable Classics
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A Practical Hipster of a Volvo
The 1950s saw most car manufacturers reaching to sports cars to burnish their image and give a spark to their product lines. This was especially true of European makers eager to get a bigger part of the lucrative U.S. market, where buyers were embracing a more spirited and involving driving experience — even while continuing…
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Alfa Romeo’s Underrated Grand Tourer
This was supposed to be an Affordable Classic piece about the entire Alfa Romeo 2600 range. It has become a piece about only one of the five models of the Alfa 2600 — the Sprint. Why? I don’t want SCM World Headquarters to be bombarded with emails, letters and tweets complaining about the definition of…
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Five Investments in Cheap Fun
We live in a Golden Age of classic cars. There are so many choices that selecting your first or next classic car has probably never presented as many good options as it does now.While prices of the blue-chip cars continue to climb to infinity and beyond, we’re also blessed with many good choices at the…
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Best Buys on the Peninsula
I think we can officially do away with the term “Affordable Classic” when speaking about Monterey. In my opinion, when using the term “affordable,” we should generally be referencing something that the masses could easily afford. The five rides I’ve chosen are valued from the mid-five digits to the mid-seven digits. That’s affordable, Monterey-style. Five…
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GT Sleepers for Monterey Week
Any of our three international GTs fit in at any setting, and the valet guys just might leave you parked in front The Monterey Week seems to symbolize all that’s grand, glorious, remarkable and somewhat unattainable in the collector car universe. I won’t repeat Jay Leno’s endlessly quoted line concerning millionaires and billionaires, but you…
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Slow to Speed, Fast to Rust
Italian sports cars quickly became successful after World War II — think Ferrari, Maserati, Lancia and Alfa Romeo — but Fiat’s entry-level two-seaters never totally captured the imagination or sales of enthusiasts. In the 1960s, Bertone and Pininfarina slowly emerged as the top Italian styling houses, and they proved the Italians were particularly good at…
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One Terrific Baby Porsche
When the Porsche Boxster show car debuted at Detroit in 1993, it created a lot of excitement. The new, smallish, two-place convertible sent writers off to research the joys and frustrations of owning 356 Speedsters and roadsters. When the 1997 Type 986 Boxster finally arrived in showrooms three years later, pent-up customer demand assured their…
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They’re Not Real, But They’re Real Fun
Ask any classic car enthusiast to name the 10 most significant vintage race cars of all time, and I’d wager that the Jaguar C-type or D-type — or maybe both — would appear on the list. It’s no accident that the XK-SS — the street-variant of the D-type — is one of the finalists in…
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Aston Martin’s Third Savior
Aston Martin and its various ownership incarnations have perfected the art of going under — think massive avalanche — and then being saved for another life of making cars. Anyone familiar with the history of this much-admired, cherished and revered company realizes that Lazarus has nothing on these car builders from the United Kingdom. The…
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The “Pretty Woman” Lotus is a Winner
Few modern classics offer more performance and visual bang than a Lotus Esprit Turbo SE. Somehow, this softened version — the less-aggressive, non-origami, original shape — has aged gracefully over the past 20 or so years. Peter Stevens gets credit for this design, with honorable mention to Julian Thompson for the refreshing in 1994. I’m…