The 2011 Salisbury Concours d'Elegance

CELEBRATING THE ART & DESIGN
OF HISTORIC AUTOMOBILES & MOTORCYCLES
The Salisbury Concours d’Elegance celebrates the fine art, creative design and
excellent craftsmanship of collectible automobiles and motorcycles. The primary
Salisbury focus is on historic vehicles, ranging from the early beginnings up to
those 50 years old. On occasion, the Concours also celebrates the beauty of more
contemporary vehicles, such as The Exotics Class this year.
The design of automobiles has a complex relationship with art, architecture, industrial
and graphic design, and even music, alternately influencing, and being influenced
by, each other in diverse ways.
Like architecture, automobile designers must pay close attention and seek a balance
among form, function, color, texture, the effects of light and shadow, and an
enormous number of technical and engineering details, as well as work within a
reasonable cost of building.
But unlike either art or architecture, which are usually one-of-a-kind works, automotive
design must resolve complicated issues such as ergonomics and product
safety, as well as suffer intense scrutiny from production engineers, manufacturing
experts and marketing gurus, and resolve issues of both automobile design and the
process of production before thousands of the same design are manufactured.
Early automobile designs were based largely on practicality, function, ease of
manufacture, and simplicity… the hood protected the motor from weather, the
fenders kept mud away, and the top, if there was one, protected occupants. Headlights
showed the way, and the horn cleared the way. Design in the early decades
was subordinate to engineering.
As inventive and creative minds were inspired by the new phenomenon of the
automobile, and as technology and inventions proliferated, artful style and comfortable
convenience began to bring a determined refinement to the raw beginnings.
Trial and error showed the way to continuous improvements.
In the teens and twenties, wealthy buyers turned to custom coachbuilders for more
lavish and prestigious designs, inspired by European styles that were longer and
lower to the ground.
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In 1928, General Motors’ Harley Earl, designer of unique custom automobiles for
Hollywood elites, established the first in-house styling studio, known as the Art &
Colour Section.
The American automobile industry subsequently became the leader in the worldwide
production of affordable and reliable cars. To stimulate continuing sales
interest, GM President Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. proposed the concept of “dynamic obsolescence”
- - regular changes in style and updated mechanical features to keep
buyers wanting more and better.
The styles rapidly evolved: during the Great Depression, designers applied scientific
ideas about aerodynamics to automobile styling and reconceived the automobile
as a complete unit rather than an assembly of parts, aided by technological
advances in sheet metal presses that allowed the body work to form continuous,
sweeping curves.
Domestic production of automobiles was severely limited during World War II due
to scarcity of materials and priority of purpose. When production resumed after
the war, most manufacturers used their pre-war designs for a year or two until
their designers, newly influenced by aeronautical technology and styling, could
catch up and begin the modern era of streamlined designs.
Today, excellence in design is of prime importance in the success of automobile
sales, as well as the automobile hobbyists’ choice of autos to collect. The best designs
have become expensive art worthy of a museum.