From Unexceptional beginnings

Hagerty Insurance's annual Festival of the Unexceptional has already become one of my unmissable highlights of the car show season in its short existence, and I reported on the 2015 and 2016 events at the time. Its history goes back one more year though, as the very first Festival took place in 2014 before I started this blog, so here I'm going to look back at that inaugural 'Concours de l'Ordinaire'. Held at Whittlebury Park on Saturday 26th July 2014, the same weekend as the nearby Silverstone Classic, it appears to have originated from a realisation that there are so many shows for valuable and exotic classic cars but nothing for the bread-and-butter cars of yesterday that in many cases are actually now much rarer than the exotica.

A rare and exotic classic car. And a Porsche.

The Festival seems to have taken some inspiration from the American Concours of LeMons and its celebration of the widely unloved and often maligned, the entry criteria being everyday family cars of the sixties, seventies and eighties. It was designed as a very informal event and an antidote to the champagne and caviar-quaffing, immaculately dressed, highly polished multi-million pound world of a traditional Concours d'Elegance, instead showcasing cars from the opposite end of the spectrum, those that actually appeared on people's driveways rather than in posters on their bedroom walls. Nobody really knew what to expect from this whole new type of event but they needn't have worried as those who made the decision to give it a go were rewarded with a most successful day that laid the foundations for something even bigger and better the following year, and I feel proud to have been visiting the Festival since its very beginnings.

That's a car and a half

Things got off to an interesting start with some confusion over where the visitor parking was, as the car park itself was dominated by classics and looked like the show field at most other events! Hagerty have built on this idea in later years and encouraged visitors to bring their own unexceptional cars, and with the car park and display area in the same field they merge together to create one big show. A gem here was a Datsun 180B estate, something I don't think I had ever seen before, and visitors were fascinated by the Mitsuoka Viewt, one of those weird Japanese cars featuring retro British styling, in this case a Nissan Micra made to look like a Mark 2 Jaguar. Some supercar owners paid a visit from the Silverstone Classic, but such exotica were far too exceptional for this event and rather than being the stars of the show as usual were largely ignored here.

A Jaganese Japuar, the bastard child of a Micra and a Mark 2 Jag

By my own count, 38.5 cars were entered for judging, and I guess you're wondering how that extra half can be possible: there was a Wolseley 1300 towing a trailer made from half a similar car! The runner up may have started my love affair with the Austin Maxi, Steve Huckle's immaculate Harvest Gold car 'Harry', and the winner was an unusual and controversially exceptional choice, Eddie Rattley's Nissan Cherry Europe. No ordinary Nissan, this is the Italian-built twin sister of the notorious Alfa Romeo Arna, and is the only roadworthy example left in the UK and possibly the world! Eddie had been unsure whether to enter it as it was technically a year too new for the 1984 cut-off, but did so anyway as there was no chance whatsoever of another attending and was unexpectedly rewarded with first prize. The trophies were in keeping with the spirit of the event, plastic mugs of plastic tea.

My mum is just like Princess Diana. Well, she owned an identical car anyway.

The car billed as the star attraction by the media was Princess Diana's Metro, brought by the Coventry Transport Museum and making its first venture outside the museum for many years. This brought back a lot of personal memories as my mum owned an identical car when I was young. A non-runner off the road since 1990, it was trailered to the event and it was amusing to watch an army of museum staff pushing it around the field, especially when they couldn't find the bonnet release and my dad had to step in and pull it for them. More trailer shenanigans concerned the Peel P50, Britain's smallest-ever production car, that Hagerty had borrowed from the National Motor Museum at Beaulieu. This was loaded onto a massive twin-axle car trailer pulled by a Range Rover, complete overkill for such a tiny load, and there was no need to use the ramps as they simply picked up the Peel with their bare hands and plonked it on the trailer!

Is that trailer big enough?

Perhaps the most astonishing car on show was an unrestored and completely rust-free Fiat Strada, which is nothing short of miraculous given this model's reputation for starting to rust as soon as it left the showroom. This remarkable car is a lucky survivor, having narrowly escaped scrapping and then use as a builder's van. Another highlight was an A-registered Austin Montego in a fetching shade of brown; I didn't even know Montegos had been made this early and it is the oldest example known to the club, registered two months before the official launch. British Leyland cars were naturally well-represented, with five Allegros, three and a half of the ADO16 series, two each of the Montego, Maxi and Metro, a Mini Clubman, a Marina, a Triumph 1500 and an Acclaim. Other staples of 1980s driveways included the Ford Cortina and Granada, and Vauxhall was represented by the Carlton and Chevette, but there was surprisingly only one Rootes Group car, a Hillman Imp.

An all-original rot-free Strada. How is this even possible?!

Among the more out of the ordinary exhibits, although nothing could really be considered ordinary at this event, were an Alfa Romeo Giulietta, a Volkswagen 412, a Skoda Rapid cabriolet, a Daihatsu Charade and a Fiat 127. It is notable that in the three years the event has been held so far it has featured three different 127s, a remarkable feat for such rare and rot-prone cars. The stories behind them are just as important as the cars themselves, and this is an event for vehicles that are regularly used and enjoyed and not just trailered to shows. I noted that several exhibits seemed to have either unusually low or unusually high mileages, and the Wolseley 1300 and Renault 30 had both done well over 300,000 miles on their original engines - who says classic cars are unreliable and only for show?

Browntastic. Montegos were everywhere when I was growing up so where did they all go?

The timing of this first event was a bit odd and may have put some people off. I think Hagerty may have intended it as a short distraction for Silverstone Classic visitors, opening it at 8am with judging at 11 so by lunchtime it was all over, but having realised its appeal in its own right they adjusted the opening times in 2015. This first-ever Festival of the Unexceptional was unanimously declared a resounding success, and from its humble beginnings it has got bigger and better every year and has firmly established its place on the annual show calendar. I am keenly looking forward to the 2017 date being announced and this time I will even have a suitable car to participate with; there have always been Maxis at the Festival and YDU 590S will hopefully soon become one of them.

You'll never see another one of these. First prize went to the unique Nissan Cherry Europe.