When requested to call essentially the most stunning automobile on the planet, the reply at all times revolves across the identical contenders. Some favor the Jaguar E-Kind, whereas others take into account the Mercedes 300SL Gullwing. Different automobiles that vie for the wonder crown embrace the Aston Martin DB5, Ferrari 250 GTO, and the Lamborghini Miura. BMW is represented by this one, the 507. Whereas I favor the roadster with the hardtop, the open-air model is sort of as gorgeous.
The 507 roadster is exceptionally uncommon, as BMW made solely 251 items. This wasn’t as a result of the corporate supposed to restrict manufacturing. As a substitute of the initially projected $5,000 sticker worth, the automobile value round $9,000, making it obscenely costly. Later in its brief life cycle, the worth rose to $10,500. BMW had deliberate to promote about 5,000 items a 12 months, however pulled the plug after solely 251 had been constructed.
Regardless that celebrities like Elvis PresleyHans Caught, and John Derek owned one, that wasn’t sufficient to steer rich prospects to spend a lot on a luxurious grand tourer. The one we photographed this weekend on the 2025 Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este is on one other stage of exclusivity. It’s the one automobile painted yellow from the manufacturing unit.
Preliminary reviews acknowledged that BMW delivered the automobile in grey and that it was later resprayed yellow on the request of the proprietor’s spouse. Nonetheless, the German luxurious model is assured that the colourful colour was how the automobile was initially ordered. A brief-lived product, the 507 was manufactured between 1956 and 1959 in Bavaria. Through the late Fifties and into the Nineteen Sixties, rival Mercedes was producing the attractive 300 SL Roadster as a follow-up to the Gullwing coupe. You possibly can think about the 507 had a tricky time competing.
It’s believed that BMW misplaced cash on each 507 it bought. Issues had been so dire that the two-seater convertible practically bankrupted the corporate on account of its excessive manufacturing prices. Though a business failure on the time, these automobiles are price thousands and thousands at this time. BMW estimates that roughly 100 examples have survived.
Right here’s what BMW says about why the 507 was an attractive failure:
“The issue was that the individuals who had the cash to purchase one had been nonetheless far too few in quantity, and prospects in the important thing export market of the USA had been already spoiled for alternative when it got here to energy and displacement; even sober previous household automobiles had an eight-cylinder engine underneath the hood stateside.”
