It’s a miracle, a Christmas miracle if you like, two months early: Somehow, like the swallows returning to Capistrano or the fish flies returning to Grosse Pointe, on the first Sunday of every November, in the concrete-and-stucco citadel that makes up the suburban paradise of Van Nuys, Calif., cute little French and Italian cars peek out from under their blue plastic storage tarps, get battery jumps, new points and condensers and maybe someone checks the tire pressures and before you know it, over 400 of them have assembled in the dusty confines of Woodley Park in Van Nuys. For one glorious day the flood plain of Woodley is transformed from a space between the strip malls into a little tiny bit of the South of France and the North of Italy.
Mama mia! Zut alors!
“This a non-judged show,” reads the official invite. “From the rough restoration project to the serious concours offering. All are welcome.”
And all always come.
That’s one thing to like about the Best of France & Italy: There is absolutely no snootiness whatsoever. You could park your beater Alfetta next to a real, concours-quality Bugatti (this exact pairing has been recorded here) and no one would bat an eyeball. In fact, the beater Alfetta might bring as much attention as the Bug. Well, almost as much.
Beverly Hills collector Bruce Meyer has brought Bugattis here. Jay Leno makes a grand and magnificent entrance every year, usually at about 10:30, usually in something grand and powerful. This year he brought The Botafogo Special, a 1917 Fiat powered by a 21.7-liter Fiat A 12 WWI airplane engine that was about a block long. When he rolled to a stop and shut it off, the crowd cheered. Yay, Jay!
You see things here that you’ll never see anywhere south of Concorso Italiano: A 1971 OTAS Grand Prix, a Zagato-bodied Lancia Appia, a beautiful 1956 Alfa Romeo 1900 C Super Sprint, a row of Renault R5 Turbo2s, a brace of Peugeot 404s, Renault Caravelles, a Tatra 87, a painfully cute 1959 Fiat Multipla, and on and on.
A German couple arrived in a 2002 Lancia Thesis. You might not have even heard of a Thesis. It’s a sedan the platform of which was never shared with any other carmaker or Lancia model, according to the owner.
“It was a horrible flop,” the owner said of the car’s sales.
How did he manage to get the Washington state license plate?
“It’s here and it’s titled, let’s not ask any questions,” he said.
Sometimes at Best of F&I you don’t ask any questions. So no one did.
Scroll through the gallery above and pick your favorites. And start scanning Craigslist for the car you will bring next year. I already have mine. Just gotta get it finished.