Cartier Style et Luxe Concours
The Goodwood Festival of Speed is arguably one of the premier motoring events in the UK calendar. As the name implies, most competitors are focused on racing up Lord March’s (rather long) drive as quickly as possible. As a spectator over many years, this only had a passing interest for me. Being able to get close to the cars in the pits and sometimes talk to the owners and drivers held more appeal.
But, the best bit of the Festival was always a short walk away from all the noise and action, on the lawn to the side of Goodwood House. Here, tucked away behind a rather large hedge you could find the Style et Luxe Concours d’Elegance. Given Lord March’s impressive array of contacts within the car community, it was highly likely that the assembled cars competing for honours would range from merely stunning to jaw-dropping. As an example, on the lawn in 2007 were five of the six Bugatti Royales made, the first time they had been together since Pebble Beach in 1985. No-one has managed to get them back together since.
However stunning the cars, the secret of success is to change the vehicles on display every year. So, around the start of the year Lord March gathers his team and they decide on six or seven themes for that year’s Style et Luxe. Within each theme they will invite entries and pick about half a dozen cars to be displayed.
Last year, for the first time since the inaugural Festival in 1993, Facel Vega was chosen as one of the themes. For the Club and the Brand, this was a great opportunity to introduce our cars to a whole new audience, both UK based and from overseas. Around 200,000 people attend the Festival each year and judging by how busy the concours area was, most of them came and had a look!
There were seven Facels on display; the Bentley MkVI Cresta II with Facel bodywork, two HK500s, the Facel II prototype, a production Facel II, a Facellia and a Facel III. People I spoke to fell into two categories. By far the larger group had never heard of Facel Vega and having seen the cars, were interested to know more. A few of them even had their phones out ‘Googling’ there and then!
For a smaller, mainly UK based group, actually coming face to face with a Facel was something unexpected and out of the ordinary. They knew about the cars, but never thought they would ever see one. To see examples of the entire range in one place was something special. For a few, I think the display made their day.
So, on to the results, which given the spirit of comeraderie at the event were not the most important thing…
The overall winner was Sascha Baggli with the Bentley Cresta. This was a significant achievement given the quality and scale of the competition. Other groups of cars included half a dozen magnificent Rolls Royce Phantom Is celebrating their centenary, a gaggle of low chassis S-Type Invictas, Alpina BMWs, Bugatti Veyrons and the best Transit van in the world, which happened to be one of the 1965 pre-production prototypes. So a Facel was awarded the top spot!
As overall winner, Sascha was removed from the Facel group. In his absence, Pierre Bivon won the group with his lovely Facel II prototype. However, I think everyone that competed was a winner, as it was an amazing ‘once in a lifetime’ experience.
From a club perspective (UK and Amicale), I think the four days of the Festival were a real success. Many people who knew about Facel Vega experienced one ‘in the flesh’ for the first time, which re-ignited their interest. Many more people, who had never heard of the make, went away knowing and talking about it. The profile of Facel Vega definitely took a step forwards during the course of the Festival of Speed, which is what we all want!
