Auction preview: a Delahaye at the pinnacle of Art Déco elegance

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Few names sit together as easily as Delahaye and Figoni et Falaschi, and you know that whenever you hear the two mentioned in the same breath, some masterpiece of Art Déco car design cannot be far away. As it happens, there's one just about to head to auction with Worldwide Auctioneers, and as far as we're concerned it's nothing less than an object of perfect beauty.

It's a 1936 Delahaye 135M Competition Court, the third of only six Type 135 faux cabriolets built by Figoni et Falaschi that year. All were built on a non-standard 2.7-metre-wheelbase chassis, and were offered with either the Coupe des Alpes 3.2-litre engine or the Competition 3½-litre.

Chassis 46837 was supplied new in February 1936 to M. Bibal and registered in the Seine department of France as 3439 RK 3, but it was sold in May 1936 to noted Delahaye racer Jean Trémoulet, and it was reregistered in Paris. He is only known to have raced it once, in the Grand Prix des Indépendents Coupe Automne, the sole touring-bodied Delahaye amidst several other 135s, all wearing Le Mans bodies and raced by Joseph Paul, Louis Villeneuve, Danniell (Daniel Porthaud) and Eugène Chaboud.

A different kind of doctor's coupé

It sold again in April 1938 to Dr. Jean-Marie Lefevre, a rural doctor in Vrigne-aux-Bois and seasoned Delahaye owner. He apparently used the car for his rounds, and was known not to hand around when a patient was in need of his help. It was all good practice for the race he entered from Paris's Place des Vosges to the Place Ducale in Charleville. He also completed some laps of Monza with it after a spot of competitive driving at Danielo in Venice, but all that good fun came to an end when the Nazis moved into France and Lefevre asked a farmer to conceal it beneath some hay bales, lest it should be seized as bountry by the Germans. Dr. Lefevre and his son were returned to it in 1945 and were surprised to find that it had survived well enough for them to drive it home.

From racing at Montlhéry to posing in Deauville

In the winter of 1946, it was bought by André Bith, a wealthy heir and keen enthusiast who owned several Delahayes and Bugattis. He entered the 135 into a race at Montlhéry on 18th April 1948, having upgraded it with a 3.8-litre engine which remains with the car to the present. A few weeks later, in May, Bith's girlfriend thought a cabriolet would be better for their trips to Deauville, so he took it to coachbuilder in Levallois who transformed it from a faux to a vrai cabriolet and painted it black, without any other change to the Figoni design. Bith's job saw him despatched to South America in 1949, so the 135 was placed into storage in an outbuilding at the Chaumont family's château in Yonne, formerly home to the Princes of Condé.

Bith returned in 1957 and sold the Delahaye in 1959 to a dealer in Porte de Paris, and in 1960 it found a buyer in Parisian real-estate tycoon and Delahaye collector Baron Henri-Robert de Nègre du Clat of 50 avenue de Wagram. After getting married, he sold 46837 in January 1966 and it ended up with a draughtsman and engineer, M. Landis, who embarked on a restoration and kept it until 1985. The new owner was another Delahaye collector, Roger Tainguy, who commenced another restoration which was completed in 1992, after which it changed hands again and was enthusiastically shown and rallied until 2017.

It's quite a car with quite a history and it could be yours. Worldwide Auctioneers is selling it on April 29th in Auburn, Indiana, along with a number of other high-end, predominantly American pre-war objects of desire. If, like us, you pine for the great days for concours d'élégances at the Bois de Boulogne and other glamorous locations around France, this could be the car for you.
 

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