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Star car sets world record at Aston Martin auction

16 June, 2014

 


Recently we told you about Roger Moore’s The Persuaders! Aston Martin going up for auction. Well, that very car has set a world record for a DBS sold at auction selling for £533,500 (approx. NZ$1,050,000).

It’s the 15th year of Bonhams’ annual auction and the Bonhams Aston Martin Works sale totalled £8.7 million (more than NZ$17 million). Over 100 lots of collectible automobilia were sold, alongside 50 vehicles which was the largest number Bonhams have ever had at the Aston Martin sale.

The world-record-setting 1970 Aston Martin DBS starred in the British television series The Persuaders! where it featured prominently in all of the show’s 24 episodes. During the auction it held pride of place at the front of the auction hall and attracted huge amounts of interest from fans of the television series as well as Aston Martin enthusiasts. The car itself was specially modified for its role in the show making itself known as the ‘third star’ behind co-stars Roger Moore and Tony Curtis.

One unexpected high-earner was the factory Vantage prototype ‘DP217’ 1963 Aston Martin DB5 project. It sold for four times its highest estimate with the gavel coming down on £393,500 (approx. NZ$775,000) and being received by plenty of applause from the room.

Bonhams Group Motoring Director James Knight said: “The sale has been one of surprise and delight. From selling a DB5 Sports Saloon project at four times its estimate, to setting world records with ‘star’ car, The Persuaders! Aston Martin DBS.

“As ever, in its 15th year the Aston Martin Works sale has been truly tremendous. After 15 years of running this sale we still continue to enjoy our very special partnership with Aston Martin, working collectively to deliver the right results for the brand and our clients.”

General Sales Manager at Aston Martin Works, Paul Spires, said: “The Bonhams auction weekend has once again more than lived up to expectations. The uniquely sociable ‘garden party’ atmosphere certainly seems to have helped some of the 2500 or so people who joined us here at Newport Pagnell take the plunge. With many exceptional sports cars sold, and bids coming in from right around the world, it’s clear that Bonhams’ Aston Martin Sale is, more than ever, a key fixture of the classic car world.”

Design accord

28 March, 2025

You can’t get much more of an art deco car than a Cord — so much so that new owners, Paul McCarthy and his wife, Sarah Selwood, went ahead and took their Beverly 812 to Napier’s Art Deco Festival this year, even though the festival itself had been cancelled.
“We took delivery of the vehicle 12 days before heading off to Napier. We still drove it all around at the festival,” says Paul.
The utterly distinctive chrome grille wrapping around the Cord’s famous coffin-shaped nose, and the pure, clean lines of the front wing wheel arches, thanks to its retractable headlamps, are the essence of deco. This model, the Beverly, has the finishing touch of the bustle boot that is missing from the Westchester saloon.

Motorman: When New Zealand built the Model T Ford

21 March, 2025

History has a way of surrounding us, hidden in plain sight. I was one of a group who had been working for years in an editorial office in Augustus Terrace in the Auckland city fringe suburb of Parnell who had no idea that motoring history had been made right around the corner. Our premises actually backed onto a century-old brick building in adjacent Fox Street that had seen the wonder of the age, brand-new Model T Fords, rolling out the front door seven decades earlier.
Today, the building is an award-winning two-level office building, comprehensively refurbished in 2012. Happily, 6 Fox Street honours its one time claim to motoring fame. Next door are eight upmarket loft apartments, also on the site where the Fords were completed. Elsewhere, at 89 Courtenay Place, Wellington, and Sophia Street, Timaru, semi-knocked-down Model Ts were also being put together, completing a motor vehicle that would later become known as the Car of the Century.