For the 18th year, Bonhams holds its all-Aston Martin auction at the legendary British automaker’s ancestral home at Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire, with the sale taking place on May 13 and offering vehicles spanning more than six decades of the exclusive and very valuable motorcars.
The Aston Martin sale, which includes the associated Lagonda marque, is highlighted by a rare 1968 Aston Martin DB6 Volante, a drophead (British for convertible) with a pre-auction estimated value between £700,000 and £900,000 ($896,000 to $1,152,000).
A number of DB6 models representing all configurations and specifications will be offered at the sale, according to Bonhams, including a 1967 DB6 Vantage Sports Saloon, valued from £280,000 to £340,000 ($359,000 to $435,000) and a 1970 DB6 Mark 2 Saloon, with a value of £270,000 to £310,000 ($346,000 to $397,000).
Another featured car is a 1964 Aston Martin DB5 coupe, the model made famous in James Bond films, this one painted in a sparkling shade of blue. Its estimated value is £500,000 to £600,000 ($640,000 to $768,000).
The earliest offering in the sale, a 1950 Lagonda 2.6 Drophead Coupe, also carries the lowest value estimate, at £12,000 to £16,000 ($15,000 to $20,500). The latest model is an as-new 2016 Aston Martin Vantage GT12, number 74 out of 100 of these all-out performance coupes built, and the only example finished in Viridian Green. Its value is £350,000 to £400,000 ($448,000 to $512,000)
For those wishing to pose as the landed gentry, there is an unusual 1996 Aston Martin V8 Sportsman Estate Car, a shooting brake (two-door station wagon to us Yanks), of which only three were built. This is one of two ordered by a sporting pair of wealthy Swiss brothers. The car started out as a standard left-hand-drive coupe and then returned to the factory to be modified as a shooting brake.
With just 21,000 kilometers (13,000 miles) showing on the odometer, the car was nonetheless regularly serviced by factory technicians at Newport Pagnell, Bonhams says. The Aston wagon is valued from £300,000 to £350,000 ($385,000 to $448,000).
As usual, the Aston Martin sale will include a gnarly barn-find fresh from long-time slumber. Though now little more than a rusted hulk, the 1957 DB2/4 MkII Sports Saloon has a colorful history, having been originally owned by renowned marque enthusiast The Honorable John Dawnay (later The Rt Hon Viscount Downe) of Wykeham Abbey.
The Aston was owned years later by Frederick “Fearless Freddie” Mills, a well-known character in the post-war British sports and entertainment scene. Mills was a boxing champion who held the world light-heavyweight crown from 1948-1950 and, after retiring from the ring, took up acting, hosting and running a successful nightclub in Soho until his death in 1965.
The DB2/4 was laid up with engine issues in the 1970s and parked in a rural out-building ever since, its engine dismantled, until it recently was brought out.
For information about Bonhams’ Aston Martin sale, visit the auction website.
