Aston Martin to wow Monterey Car Week

Aston Martin will be the first marque showcased at RM Sotheby's inaugural one-make auction at the 2019 Monterey Car Week in the USA later this year.

In essence, one entire night of the three-day Monterey Classic Car Auction — one of the world's most prestigious automotive auctions — will be devoted exclusively to Aston Martin vehicles.

As part of the 2019 Monterey Classic Car Auction, which in 2018 saw car sales total a whopping $521 million ($US371m — a record for the event), the one-make Aston auction will take place on the night of August 15.

Aston Martin says the auction will showcase more than 30 road-going and track-ready sports cars from its illustrious 106-year history.

Topping the list of cars to go under the hammer in the inaugural one-make sale is a 1964 Aston Martin DB5 with almost 40 years of single private ownership.

"This early interest in the inaugural auction from owners around the world is an extremely
positive sign," said Paul Spires, president of Aston Martin Works, the global heritage and restoration division of the brand.

Only the fifth DB5 ever made, the early 1964 Aston Martin was hand-built at the Aston Martin factory in Newport Pagnell.

This particular left-hand drive vehicle was sold as new back in the 1960s by British Motor Car Distributors in San Francisco, to the Washington Fruit & Produce Corporation.

It was then snapped up by the consignor in Sausalito, near San Francisco, in 1981 and has been in the same hands ever since.

The white, six-cylinder Aston Martin DB5 will likely fetch a significant sum of several million dollars.

In 2018 the Monterey Classic Car auction set a new record, with RM Sotherby's selling a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO for $68.6 million ($US48.8m).