It must have been thrilling for the owners of the beautiful Zagato-bodied cars shown at this year’s Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance to have none other than Andrea Zagato, the head of the legendary Milan, Italy, design company, among the class judges examining their sports and racing machines.
The Pebble Beach Concours honored the 100th anniversary of Zagato with two special classes, prewar and postwar, that showed off the purposeful designs on a host of great European automobiles – Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, Fiat, Abarth, AC, Lancia and Bristol.
Zagato, the grandson of company founder Ugo Zagato and son of longtime company head Elio Zagato, prowled through the collection, smiling happily as he met with those who had brought their cars created by Carrozzeria Zagato.
“How could I not enjoy the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Zagato?” he said as walked around a 1959 Lancia Flaminia Zagato Coupe, and chatted with owner Larry Solomon of Palo Alto, California. “Such a wonderful day.”
The Zagato classes were impressive indeed. The Zagato Centennial Prewar class was made up of four sports racers from the 1930s, three Alfas and a Maserati, all with great competition histories.
That class was won by a 1932 Maserati V4 Zagato Spider owned by Lawrence Auriana of Greenwich, Connecticut. The Maserati also was honored with the concours-wide Briggs Cunningham Trophy.
The Zagato Centennial Postwar class had 11 cars from the 1950s and ’60s in contention, a period that showed the blossoming of the carrozzeria’s distinctive aerodynamic style.
Among them, a 1964 Alfa Romeo TZ1 Zagato Coupe, a 1958 Fiat Abarth 750 Zagato Coupe, a 1965 Lamborghini 3500 GTZ Zagato Coupe and a 1956 Ferrari 250 GT Zagato Berlinetta Speciale, which won the Most Elegant Sports Car award for the entire concours.
The Best in Class Award went to a stunning 1962 Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato Coupe. The Aston Zagato had a fine outing at Pebble Beach, also winning The Vitesse – Elegance Trophy and being named as one of the four finalists for the 2019 Best of Show award.
