Like discovering an album you listened to on repeat as a teenager is passing a significant number of decades on sale, some of the world’s most covetable performance and collector cars are probably older than you expect.
To mark our own 20th anniversary in classic car storage, below we thought we’d take the opportunity to indulge and to pick out 20 desirable models that are also celebrating notable automotive anniversaries have reached notable anniversaries in 2024. It’s a celebration of everything from the most accomplished grand tourers of the early 2000s, to half-century old supercars, 1960s muscle cars, and an all-time great that arrived less than a decade after the end of the Second World War.
The Top 20
To jump to any of these, simply click on the name in the list.
- Aston Martin DB9 (20 years old)
- Ferrari 612 Scaglietti (20 years old)
- Maserati Quattroporte V (20 years old)
- Noble M400 (20 years old)
- Porsche 911 GT3 (25 years old)
- Pagani Zonda (25 years old)
- Audi RS2 Avant (30 years old)
- Ferrari F355 (30 years old)
- Venturi 400 (30 years old)
- Ferrari 288 GTO (40 years old)
- Ford RS200 (40 years old)
- Lamborghini Countach (50 years old)
- Ferrari 275 (60 years old)
- Ford Mustang (60 years old)
- Honda S600 (60 years old)
- Pontiac GTO (60 years old)
- Porsche 911 (60 years old)
- Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint (70 years old)
- Jaguar D-Type (70 years old)
- Mercedes-Benz 300SL (70 years old)
Aston Martin DB9 (20 years old)
If the DB7 had made the public weak at the knees, the Aston Martin DB9 rendered them puddles on the floor. Credited to Ian Callum (who had worked on the DB7 and then 2001’s Vanquish) and Henrik Fisker (better known, sadly, for two failed attempts at launching his own car company), the DB9 is one of very few cars on which it’s difficult to find a bad angle.
Yet it wasn’t just a pretty face. Compared to the Vanquish launched three years earlier, the DB9’s cabin was a vast improvement too, while it was dynamically capable too. Its 5.9-litre V12 produced 450bhp, the traditional automatic gearbox was far preferable to the automated manuals prevalent at the time, and it handled too, with the caveat of a surprisingly firm ride in early cars.
Tantalisingly for collectors today, the DB9 is also among the most accessible Aston Martins, after only its predecessor the DB7. One factor is its popularity: That shape, that V12, and the glowing reviews made it one of the brand’s most popular models by that point, comfortably outselling the DB7. Predominantly aluminium architecture has helped it last, too.
Ferrari 612 Scaglietti (20 years old)
Britain’s grand tourer isn’t the only one celebrating its 20th year in 2024. Italy has a fine GT tradition too and Ferrari especially, and in 2004, it launched the 612 Scaglietti as a replacement for the pretty but by then more than decade-old 456.
It’s fair to say the 612 courted some controversy at launch. While it’s ageing gracefully, it’s arguably still not as elegant as the car it replaced, and being launched the same year as the DB9 wasn’t flattering to its Ken Okuyama-penned lines either. In fairness to the Pininfarina designer, the 612 was a case of the reality not quite matching his rather more beautiful sketches for the model, while it’s a colour-sensitive car too – early road tests of a light gold model didn’t show off its best side.
Thankfully, it had plenty going for it on the road. “No car this big and heavy [the 612 weighed in at a claimed 1870kg] has ever felt this light on its feet” said Autocar magazine. It was easy to live with too, perhaps best illustrated in the famous Top Gear TV spot in which Jeremy Clarkson in the 612 raced his co-presenters in a light aircraft to a ski resort in Switzerland. It’s a genuine four-seater, too, furthering its GT credentials.
Maserati Quattroporte V (20 years old)
If you want a four-door Ferrari, your options are limited. The recently-launched Purosangue is one solution, though its semi-SUV silhouette may not appeal. You could track down a Ferrari-engined Lancia Thema 8.32, wait around for the 1980 Ferrari Pinin concept to reemerge for sale, or perhaps get on good terms with the Sultan of Brunei and try to tease one of his Pininfarina-built 456 ‘Venice’ saloons away from him. Alternatively, you could buy a Maserati Quattroporte V.
The Maserati has the wrong Italian badge of course, but the Quattroporte – revealed in 2003, but on sale in 2004, so we’re including it here – was as close as we’ve got to such a thing as a Ferrari saloon. Pininfarina styling, the dry-sump ‘F136’ V8 also found in the Ferrari F430 (albeit crossplane in the Maserati, rather than using a flat-plane crank), a racing-style automated manual gearbox like Ferrari’s ‘F1’ transmission, and stunning Pininfarina styling.
Not to take anything away from the Maserati badge or what the company’s engineers achieved though, because the fifth-generation Quattroporte was as good to drive as it was to look at or listen to. Imperfect, for sure, but one of the best modern Maseratis, entirely worthy of the storied badge, and a good stand-in for a four-door Ferrari to boot.
[Image credit: Maserati]
Noble M400 (20 years old)
After the Jaguar XJ220 and McLaren F1 burst onto the supercar scene in the early 1990s, Britain’s supercar-building momentum seemed to fizzle out. Jaguar got its fingers burned, and McLaren fizzled out once its racing exploits ceased, only returning with the MP4-12C in 2011. Thankfully, a man named Lee Noble wasn’t about to let the UK drop off the supercar-building map.
Noble had worked at Ultima in the 1980s but the first car to bear his name was the Ford V6-engined Noble M10 in 1999. This was swiftly followed up by 2000’s turbocharged Noble M12, which saw people really sit up and take notice – and its ultimate incarnation came with the 425bhp M400 in 2004.
No Noble could be considered ‘ordinary’, but it takes something truly special to win Autocar’s Best Driver’s Car competition, something the M400 did in 2004, joining such luminaries as the original Honda NSX, Porsche 911R, Ferrari 550 Maranello, and Lotus Elise. In the M400, the twin-turbocharged 3-litre Ford V6 made 425bhp, against a weight of barely over a tonne, but it’s the chassis that makes it one of the best.
[Image credit: LBI Limited]
Porsche 911 GT3 (25 years old)
The 911 GT3 has become a performance car phenomenon, with each new iteration as hotly anticipated as a new BMW M3, Golf GTI, or mid-engined Ferrari. Yet the earliest arrived as recently as 25 years ago, when Porsche first applied its GT division treatment to the then still relatively new 996-generation 911.
Visually distinctive thanks to a curving bodykit and folded-over rear wing, it’s most different from the standard 996 under the skin, using the celebrated dry sump ‘Mezger’ engine – related to those in the 962 and 911 GT1 Le Mans cars – for, in the original model, a now modest-sounding 355bhp.
Firmer suspension, more powerful brakes, some lightweight touches, and an optional Clubsport pack with a half-cage, bucket seats, and a single-mass flywheel (among other changes) further differentiate the GT3 from the regular 911, and it’s a recipe Porsche has evolved and adapted for GT3s – and the more track-focused GT3 RS models – ever since. The original may not be heralded as the best, but it remains a fantastic driver’s car to this day.
[Image credit: Porsche]
Pagani Zonda (25 years old)
It’s one thing building a supercar, but it’s quite another building one that is every bit as desirable as long-established models from places like Maranello, Woking, or Stuttgart. The Pagani Zonda, quarter of a century old in 2024, had the kind of instant legitimacy that other startup supercar makers would kill for, from knockout styling to staggering attention to detail, and the prestige of an AMG V12 sitting between the axles.
Horacio Pagani’s background didn’t hurt: he was once chief engineer at Lamborghini. But the Zonda was simply a covetable product, looking like nothing else and driving as well as any of its more storied rivals. In its 2002 road test of a Zonda S, Autocar said it had “the inherent balance and grip to be driven fast with confidence”, and declaring “the supercar you’ve never heard of is also the best new one you can buy”.
The Zonda only got faster and more beautiful over the years, Pagani cleverly refining the design and making its already ornate cabin even more intricate. So desirable was the Zonda that even after its replacement, the Huayra arrived in 2011. Pagani continued building Zonda variants for its customers and has just released another in 2024, the Arrivederci, even now that the Huayra itself has been replaced by the Utopia.
[Image credit: Pagani]
Audi RS2 (30 years old)
If you had to narrow it down, just two cars made the idea of a fast estate cool. One was Volvo’s 850, specifically the stripped-out and roll-caged one that bounced from kerb to kerb in 1994’s British Touring Car Championship. Winless it might have been, but if you don’t admire Volvo’s moxie, barging into a saloon car series with an estate, then you’re beyond saving.
The other probably holds even more appeal though. The Audi RS2 Avant, launched the same year as Volvo’s BTCC assault, also had five cylinders, but here they were turbocharged to 311bhp, sent their power to all four wheels, and were handled by a chassis co-developed with Porsche. Look closely and you can see Porsche’s visual cues all over the RS2, from the door mirrors to the Porsche Cup wheels, and in Nogaro Blue especially, there’s rarely been a finer estate car shape.
It didn’t have the lairy balance we’ve come to expect from modern performance estates, but its viceless handling set the template for three decades of fast Audi estates to come, and if you’ve not driven an RS2, you may be surprised how involving it is – particularly managing the onset of its boosty power delivery, which doesn’t give you everything until about 4000rpm. Time it right, and few cars will get out of a corner quicker.
Ferrari F355 (30 years old)
Depending on who you speak to, the Ferrari F355 might be one of the most accomplished cars Ferrari has ever made. Effectively a heavily-revised version of the Ferrari 348, the F355 righted many of its predecessor’s supposed wrongs, and while it was more technologically advanced (introducing Ferrari’s ‘F1’ automated manual gearbox, for instance) it also offers a refreshingly straightforward driving experience.
And yes, it’s now a surprising 30 years old, which makes its output of 375bhp from a 3.5-litre naturally-aspirated, flat-plane crank V8 – for more than 100bhp per litre – all the more impressive. Ferrari was among the first companies to experiment with five-valve cylinder heads to maximise air flow into and out of the cylinders, contributing to the high output.
There were chassis changes too, to tame the 348’s occasionally wayward behaviour, while Pininfarina smoothed off the 348’s 1980s styling and Ferrari improved the interior. Reviews were universally positive; in Car’s 1994 review, it said “the numbers… simply don’t matter. The look, the sound and the feel of the thing defy figures”, while Autocar gave it five stars, calling it “a landmark car for Ferrari”.
[Image credit: Ferrari]
Venturi 400 (30 years old)
Venturi’s line of 1980s and 1990s sports cars, starting with 1987’s MVS Venturi, 1994’s Venturi 400 – 30 years old this year – and the Atlantique of 1996, is sometimes damned with the faint praise of being ‘French Ferraris’. The subtext is that they’re mere copies, and when you look at the 400, it’s hard not to see some F40 in the design – but that does a disservice to what are uniquely appealing cars in their own right.
The common theme, carried over to the 400, is a mid-mounted V6 engine. The 400 was a little more serious than its MVS Venturi predecessor though, developed primarily for competition, specifically GT racing, and while the shape was similar to the MVS, its bodywork was pumped up for the demands of racing: deep splitters, wide arches, and a huge rear wing.
The twin-turbocharged, 3-litre V6 was far removed from the PRV engine’s other applications, such as Alpine A310s and the DeLorean DMC-12, making more than 400bhp. Venturi built fewer than 100 cars, mostly for racing, and most of those for a one-make series, the Venturi Cup. They are by most accounts fantastic to drive, and as well as the handful of road cars, it’s not unusual to see old racers being road-registered today.
[Image credit: Vitor Antonio]
Ferrari 288 GTO (40 years old)
They didn’t call them hypercars back in 1984, but as the Ferrari 288 GTO is at the start of the lineage that subsequently included the F40, F50, Enzo, and LaFerrari, you could make a reasonable case for it being the brand’s first hypercar. 395bhp from a twin-turbocharged 2.9-litre mid-mounted V8 was certainly a step above more conventional fast cars of the era – a 911 Turbo was 70bhp shy.
Visually related to the 308, the 288 GTO served – as the ‘Omologato’ part of its name suggests – as a Group B homologation variant, for use in customer GT racing. That meant a run of at least 200 units to meet the requirements (in the event, Ferrari built more than 270), though ultimately the model had no distinguished racing career.
Being on Ferrari’s ‘list’ is considered a relatively modern quirk, Maranello and only Maranello deciding whether you deserve the chance to buy a certain model, but it happened with the GTO too, and the first cars tended to end up in the hands of factory racing drivers and VIPs. Today they’re spread more widely, but those fortunate enough to have owned them say they are, below the limit at least, a genuine pleasure to drive.
[Image credit: Ferrari]
Ford RS200 (40 years old)
The Ford RS200 is one of the great “what ifs?” of the automotive world. Designed from the ground up to dominate Group B rallying, its chances in competition were cut short by the category’s cancellation at the end of 1986, spurred on by the death of four spectators when an RS200 lost control and plunged into a crowd, and then the deaths of Lancia pairing Henri Toivonen and Sergio Cresto in Corsica just a few events later.
1986 was thus the RS200’s first and only year, though the car itself had debuted in 1984, rising from the ashes of the cancelled Escort RS1700T project. The RS200 took the form of an all-wheel drive, mid-engined coupe, with a fibreglass body shaped by Ghia and built by the unlikely but experienced hands at Reliant.
Road cars made 249bhp from their 1.8-litre Cosworth BDT engines, but rallying variants made closer to 500bhp, and when the RS200’s WRC career was cut short and most cars headed to rallycross, power climbed to more than 800bhp in some cases. Like many Group B homologation cars, RS200s can be a nuisance to drive slowly but make a lot more sense at full chat – and cause quite a scene even when parked.
Lamborghini Countach (50 years old)
Whether you prefer the early, unadorned Gandini cars or the later bewinged LP5000 and 25th Anniversary (the latter reskinned by none other than Horacio Pagani), the Lamborghini Countach remains one of the definitive supercar shapes. You wouldn’t bet against it retaining its impact at 75 or 100 years old either.
While its 3.9-litre V12 was an evolution of the Bizzarrini-designed engine from the Miura (albeit now installed longitudinally), the Countach LP400’s styling was anything but. Instead, we got a sharp wedge taking its cues from some of Marcello Gandini’s concepts for Alfa Romeo and Lancia, and a set of scissor doors – a cue that Lamborghini uses on its V12 models to this day.
The Countach has acquired a perhaps unfair reputation for being a little truck-like to drive, but contemporary reviews, and the opinions of many owners, contradict this – it’s still a blistering performer, a neat handler, and typical early-supercar quirks like poor visibility, significant width, and heavy low-speed steering aside, not as intimidating as one might expect either; certainly not bad for a car reaching its half-century.
[Image credit: Lamborghini]
Ford Mustang (60 years old)
Along with the Mini and the Beetle, there may be no more widely-recognised nameplate than Mustang. Unveiled in 1964 as a sporty alternative to Ford’s Falcon ‘compact’ car, the Mustang became an instant success. In fact, that’s probably an understatement: Ford took more than 20,000 orders on the day it was revealed, and made more than 1.3 million in its first two years of production.
The Mustang is now in its seventh generation but there’s still something very special indeed about the very earliest cars. Much like that other American icon, the Corvette, the earliest ‘1964½’ Mustangs weren’t even really designed as performance cars – the standard engine was a modest 2.8-litre ‘Thriftpower’ inline six, with V8s available as part of the Mustang’s vast range of option packages.
Early advertisements were aimed as much at women as they were men, though the very first Mustang buyer, 22-year old Gail Wise from Illinois, didn’t even need the advertising – she bought her blue convertible from the showroom floor, two days before the Mustang’s official debut at the World’s Fair on April 15, 1964. Original Mustangs need no advertising today, either, as one of the world’s most desirable and popular classic cars.
Honda S600 (60 years old)
Honda’s very first production passenger car was a sports car, which tells you all you need to know about the company’s attitude to engineering and driver appeal. That was 1963’s S500, but a year later, Honda expanded its tiny 531cc four-cylinder engine to 606cc, and created the S600.
It is a truly remarkable car, smaller than a contemporary MG Midget, but rather than the 46bhp and slog to 5000rpm of a 948cc A-Series, the two-thirds scale Honda motor featured double overhead cams, a roller-bearing crankshaft, four Keihin carburettors, a chain-driven final drive, and 57bhp at a howling 8500rpm. It was truly more like a four-wheeled motorcycle.
The S600 is also really rather pretty, at its best in roadster form – a coupe was also offered – and with slightly simpler, less adorned styling than the S800 that replaced it in 1966. Japanese cars have taken some time to become truly appreciated by enthusiasts and collectors, but among the country’s older models, the now 60-year-old S600 is one of the best examples of what Honda’s engineers were capable of.
[Image credit: Honda]
Pontiac GTO (60 years old)
The Pontiac GTO wasn’t the first muscle car, but it’s surely one of the cars that best defines the breed. It certainly ticks all the boxes: a regular family saloon turned into a performance car thanks to an oversized V8 engine, and a laundry list of options to help it put its newfound power to the road.
The GTO started effectively as an option package on the ‘mid-size’ Pontiac Tempest, and included a 325bhp 6.4-litre V8, twin exhaust pipes, a three-speed floor-mounted gearshift, stiffer springs, thick anti-roll bars, and wider wheels and tyres. Further options gave you more gears and eventually more power, and even its ‘Gran Turismo Omologato’ name was legitimate, as Pontiac had the car homologated for racing with the FIA.
Perhaps the GTO’s real significance though was in kicking off the golden era of muscle cars. It was swiftly followed by the Oldsmobile 442, Chevrolet Chevelle SS, and Buick Gran Sport from GM’s other divisions, and then a string of rivals from Plymouth, Dodge, Ford and others. Fierce competition saw power and features spiral ever upwards until 1973’s oil crisis finally called time on the segment.
Porsche 911 (60 years old)
The Porsche 911 is nothing less than the world’s best sports car – and you could reasonably justify it having held that title now for 60 years. The car’s performance has moved on unimaginably far in the intervening period but the name and the silhouette, and the ethos, have all remained the same.
The car famously debuted as the 901 before Peugeot raised objections, so before 1964 was even out the car bore its more familiar name. A replacement for the four-cylinder 356, early 911s squeezed a 2-litre flat six behind the rear axle, with pretty styling largely credited to Ferdinand ‘Butzi’ Porsche, grandson of the company’s founder.
There are few places an early 911 looks inappropriate, few journeys that haven’t been undertaken in one, and few forms of motorsport that a 911 hasn’t competed in. Early, short wheelbase models can bite in the wrong hands, but are a pleasure to drive in the right ones – and today there’s even a race series dedicated to 2-litre 911s, the 2.0L Cup. Doubtless the 911 will still be coveted in another sixty years.
[Image credit: Porsche]
Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint (70 years old)
Alfa Romeo’s pre-war cars were grand racers and luxury cars, aimed at the well-heeled and blue-blooded. In a financially depressed postwar Italy however, the brand began to offer cars for a wider audience. The impressive thing about this move was that, much like Lancia, the company lost seemingly little of its prestige, engineering focus, or sporting appeal.
The Giulietta line introduced in 1954 was the perfect example. It debuted in Bertone-designed Sprint coupe form, with a modest 1.3-litre engine but a pair of camshafts, allowing for a healthy power output of nearly 80bhp, and a top speed of over 100mph – the MG Magnette, a sports saloon in its own right, made only 60bhp from an overhead valve 1.5, and stopped accelerating at 80mph.
You paid for the privilege with the Alfa – these still weren’t cheap cars, even if they were more affordable than before – but the Giulietta’s solid sporting base eventually expanded into a range of coupes, saloons, and coachbuilt specials. It was unsurprisingly popular, Alfa building more than 24,000 Sprints alone, and tens of thousands more Giulietta Berlinas. It’s arguably the definitive line of 1950s sports coupes and saloons.
[Image credit: Alfa Romeo]
Jaguar D-Type (70 years old)
Perhaps there was something in the water in 1954, because not only did it yield the iconic Mercedes-Benz 300SL and the Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint, but also the Jaguar XK140, and perhaps even more amazingly, the stunning Jaguar D-Type.
Not unlike the 300SL, the D-Type was designed with one eye on competition. But while the Mercedes was derived from racing cars, the D-Type was itself a racer, created specifically to enter, and to win, the Le Mans 24 Hours. It was hugely advanced as a result, with a predominantly aluminium monocoque, disc brakes adopted from its C-Type predecessor, and a focus on aerodynamics that gave it a flat underside and a tall tail fin for straight-line stability.
It didn’t win at Le Mans in ‘54, beaten to the line by Scuderia Ferrari, and its 1955 victory was overshadowed by the tragic and harrowing death of 83 spectators when Pierre Levegh speared off the road in his Mercedes. The D-Type won again in 1956 with the Ecurie Ecosse team, and yet again in 1957, while unfinished racing D-Types were converted to more road-biased XKSS sports cars. Both are among Jaguar’s greatest cars.
[Image credit: Jaguar]
Mercedes-Benz 300SL (70 years old)
Some collector cars tick all the boxes, and the Mercedes-Benz ‘W198’ 300SL is one such car: Stunning to behold, mechanically intriguing, technically advanced, leagues ahead of its contemporaries to drive, and with close links to dominating competition machines. That the car is now 70 years old seems remarkable; it could easily be a decade newer without anyone raising an eyebrow.
Modern values reflect its pedigree, rarity and desirability, but in its day the 300SL wasn’t even especially expensive given what it offered – an on-the-road price of £4392 in 1955 equates to under £100,000 in 2024, when a modern AMG GT is more than £160,000. And the GT doesn’t have a racing-derived spaceframe chassis, nor Mille Miglia and Le Mans victories to its name.
The naturally-aspirated and mechanically injected 3-litre straight six made strong power for the 1950s, with 240bhp and in Autocar’s hands, 0-60mph in under nine seconds and a top speed of 135mph. Swing-axle rear suspension required confident inputs from its driver, but like the best cars of its era, even a moderately-driven 300SL could be comfortably the quickest car on the road.
[Image credit: Mercedes-Benz]
