The eyes of the automotive world were fixed on New York last night (10 December) as a truly stellar line-up of classic cars crossed the block at RM Sotheby’s Driven by Disruption event, led by none other than Juan Manuel Fangio’s 1956 290MM, which fetched £18.8m.
The final price was some way short of the 250GTO sold by Bonhams in 2014, but nonetheless became the most valuable car to be sold at auction in 2015, comfortably surpassing the £11.8m paid for the ex-Alain Delon California Spider at Artcurial’s Retromobile sale.
Also making mega money – and becoming the most valuable British car ever sold at auction – was a 1962 Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato. It represented the first time in a number of years that a Zagato has been sold on the open market, and eventually made £9.4m.
It was followed by a 1933 Pierce-Arrow Silver Arrow, which beat its estimate to make just under £2.5m.
Meanwhile, a Ferrari Enzo that once belonged to boxer Floyd Mayweather sold for £2.2m and a Lamborghini Miura P400 SV was snapped up for £1.6m.
The biggest surprise of the night was sprung by a 1964 Porsche 356C that sported a psychedelic paint job acquired during its time with Janis Joplin. It breezed past its £260-400,000 pre-sale estimate to sell for more than £1.1m.
