The Classic Remise is ideal for spending quality time in Germany’s industrial heartland. We are pretty hooked on the car shows organised in Essen, and we constantly add new experiences to make the 5-600km trip more diverse.
The Remise proved to be an ideal stopover during these trips, with its extensive opening hours, elaborate catering facilities and breathtaking cars. For more info on hours and facilities, see their website.
The Classic Remise Düsseldorf is a service centre specialising in classic and luxury cars. But this dry description does not do justice, as it is also a fascinating automotive pilgrimage site offering breathtaking experiences even for those who do not wish to spend any cash.
The premises of the Remise were converted from a refurbished locomotive garage. The unusual layout it inherited from the locomotives offers a brilliant showcase for exotic cars.
The main hall showcases the stock of a few selected dealers and also hosts a restaurant that we love to revisit during our trips to Essen.
The exterior hemisphere is filled with classic and exotic car specialists on one side, and glass cases offer the opportunity to see rare collector’s items. These cars include some really expensive and exotic vehicles, sometimes in improbable combinations, like a Mercedes SLS next to a classic Alfa Giulia with a Carabinieri police outfit.
Below, we will present to you five favourite specimens from the visit. The first one is not even from the Remise, but a car we saw in the parking lot. This Porsche 356 is painted with Porsche’s iconic Salzburg red racing livery bearing homage to the car with race number 23 at the 1970 Le Mans race.
The 356 was Porsche’s first series production car that recently celebrated its 70th anniversary with appropriate shows. The livery is not time conform, though, as it was invented decades later.
In 1970, the Porsche 917 K with the iconic livery and race number 23 earned Porsche’s first overall victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The Salzburg red and white livery was inspired by the colours of the Austrian flag, as the Porsche factory racing team was hosted by Porsche Salzburg at the time.
The next highlight is a Harlequin Porsche 911 that features the baseline of all major Porsche liveries. The Porsche 993 GT2 race car entered the 1997 FIA GT championship.
Another unexpected highlight was the blue high-speed transporter purpose-built by the racing department of Mercedes for transporting race cars in the ‘50s at speeds of over 150 km/h.
As the original no longer exists, the vehicle was completely reconstructed with the help of documents from the archives of the Mercedes Museum. Even Jay Leno acquired a faithful replica.
At number two, we list not one but two cars: a duo of BMW’s iconic 507s. This exquisite classic was BMW to join Mercedes in the lucrative US luxury car market.
The 507 used a shortened 503 frame with a reduced wheelbase, designed by Albrecht von Goertz, with a hand-formed aluminium body and hardly two specimens with exactly the same shape. The 3.2 V8 produced 150 HP and accelerated the 507 in a bit over 11 seconds.
Our personal favourite of the fleet was one of the first post-war supercars, the Maserati A6G/54, with its most iconic iteration, the double bubble coupé coachbuilt by Zagato. The Maserati A6G was Maserati’s road-legal two-door coupé and spyder series built between 1947 and 1956. The model generation received its name after Alfieri Maserati and their straight-six engine. G stands for Ghisa, which referred to the iron-cast engine series of road-legal cars. These exotic sportscars were often tailor-made, with coachwork from Allemano, Bertone, Frua, Ghia, Pininfarina, Vignale and Zagato.
The A6G/54 is the last iteration (basically, almost a new model), inaugurated at the 1954 Mondial de l’Automobile in Paris. The new grand tourer was powered by a new double overhead camshaft inline-six derived from the racing engines of A6GCS and A6GCM.
This Maserati 1955 A6GS 2000 Zagato is an old friend. We met this car at the Artcurial Auction of Retromobile 2018 for the first time, and this car never fails to impress. It is equipped with a 2-litre engine producing 170 HP and was restored in 2015 after a total loss in the seventies. It has remained a personal favourite since then. They used an A6 Zagato body stored in England with which Stirling Moss participated in the 1956 Mille Miglia (with starting number 318).
