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2016 London Classic Car Show announced

21 April, 2015

 

The first London Classic Car Show took place in January of 2015, and, following praise from visitors and exhibitors, will be returning for 2016. Many exhibitors at the inaugural show have already rebooked for the next event, and will be joined by a host of new exhibitors, including classic car dealers and specialists.

Marques such as Aston Martin, Citroen, and Maserati, as well as industry specialists like Nicholas Mee, Jim Stokes Workshops, and Classic Motor Cars are amongst the many names to have rebooked for 2016.

To accommodate the significantly increased scale of the next event, the show is to be 50-per-cent bigger. The increase in size will allow for an even larger rendering of one of the show’s standout features — The Grand Avenue. Running through the centre of the show, The Grand Avenue provides a runway for some of history’s most iconic cars to parade.

The Grand Avenue’s variety is second to none, with the inaugural show hosting everything from 100-year-old veterans and ’60s supercars, to Grand Prix racers, most notable of which was Ayrton Senna’s Lotus 97T. So, not only is The Grand Avenue to be extended for 2016, but it will also host many more live performances.

Event director Bas Bungish says, “Our aim with the London Classic Car Show was to create a show that really raises the bar. We did that … motor shows will never be the same again.”

Keep an eye out for more news on the London Classic Car Show 2016.

The butterfly effect

18 June, 2026

The man on the mountain bike pedalled over, taking it all in. Gazing in wonderment at this small Japanese coupe with butterfly doors, he said, “Wow, I have never seen one of these before. What is it?” When I told him it was a Toyota, he nearly fell off his bike.
The Toyota Sera is unique amongst ’90s Japanese coupes. The Sera, which is Italian for ‘evening’, can trace its roots back to Toyota’s AXV-II concept car. Launched as part of a trio of Toyota concept cars at the 1987 Tokyo Motor Show, it shared its underpinnings with the P70 Toyota Starlet. The similarities ended there, thanks to the AXV-II’s low-slung and rounded coupe styling with butterfly doors. These doors were held upright by gas struts when fully open. Glass covered the upper section of the doors and the rear hatchback.
These features, much to everyone’s surprise, were carried over to the production Sera in 1990. Toyota marketed the Sera, which means ‘will be’ in Spanish and ‘princess’ in Hebrew, as a funky alternative to the much-loved MR2.

Racing Mazdas

12 June, 2026

Both Rod Millen and Ron Kendall were rotary racing kings, emanating from the North Shore of Auckland, where I grew up. And the ultimate rotary techno guru was Bill Shiells, who developed the engine into a rocket ship while working out of Gulf Mazda in Takapuna from 1969, and later in his own business, Rotorsport. He began to extract some phenomenal horsepower from the enigmatic rotary engine. Bill was one of the first to race the Mazda RX-2 Coupe in 1971 and achieved immediate success, causing others to sit up and take notice, particularly the North Shore’s racing elite. They included Robbie Francevic, Rod Millen, Ron Kendall, John Woolf, John Le Feuvre, and Rex Findlay.