1 of 18! 1953 Chrysler Ghia Special Coupe
We recently saw a later offspring from the design partnership between Chrysler and Ghia of Italy in the 1963 Chrysler Turbine Car. What a difference a decade makes! This 1953 Chrysler Ghia Special Coupe is worlds different in style and futuristic feel than the Turbine Car but it’s fantastic in its own way. It’s listed here on eBay in Phoenix, Arizona, and the seller is asking $550,000 or you can make an offer. You read that right, $550,000 or offer. Thanks to Larry D. for sending in this tip!
The Chrysler/Ghia partnership would produce about a half-dozen concept vehicles and some of them made it into production, such as this 1953 Special Coupe. Fewer than 20 Chrysler Ghia Special Coupes were built so they’re rare. They were never sold in the United States, at least by Chrysler dealerships, but they were sold in Europe by Société France Motors.
The color looks almost like a robin’s egg blue, but this car is, or was, originally gray. The seller thinks that it may have been repainted at some point and they have provided one hundred photos! Sadly, out of literally one hundred photos, there is not one engine photo or underside photo. I know, just when we all thought that 2021 would be a better year than 2020 was. For my $550,000, I want to see at least one engine photo. What a beautiful car, though, at least design-wise. The engine should be a Chrysler 331 cubic-inch FirePower Hemi V8 with 180 horsepower.
The gorgeous interior in red leather is a thing of beauty and wonder, but not quite up to the Chrysler Turbine Car interior as far as outside-the-box space-age design. In 1953, there were churning out movies about landing on Mars as fast as they could so they didn’t quite have a grasp on the whole space-age thing yet. This car needs a full restoration, however, and that will not be cheap. I’d probably plan on a solid $150,000 for that and that’s probably on the low end. One sold in 2017 by our friends at Hyman, LTD in St. Louis who had it listed for $575,000 and it was drop-dead gorgeous.
Parts of this car look great and they could be reused rather than restored which would save a lot of money, but the body is showing a lot of dings and chips and what looks like body putty (?). Hopefully not, but unless I’m mistaken, some possible bodywork has been done on it at some point. It looks a little wavy, certainly not what a 1 of 18 concept-to-limited-production car should look like. A really nice example sold at an RM Auction in Monaco in 2014 for $462,353 so I’m not sure if they’ll get their asking price given the work that needs to be done to bring it back to its former glory. Have any of you seen one?
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Comments
eBay seems like a strange venue to sell a half million dollar car.
The same seller has a 1930 Cadillac Series 452 V16 listed on eBay for $898,800.00.
design by Virgil Exner ( highdays !!) .
As far as I know only build by Ghia, not designed .
Because this was a lot cheaper …
They are all different in details !
At present we are restoring one in Italy .
Very well build , Ghia did a great job .Weldings close to perfect !
New Yorker shortened chassis , 331 ci engine .
The car I look at was and will be again a light blue metallic and an very dark antracite ,almost black, metallic roof .
Engine bay completely in a light blue-ish grey .
Interior and dashboard in red .
I find these cars extremely interesting .
And easy to drive , like all Chrysler 300 .
S.
Thats a great color combo …. maybe this car needs the same treatment …..looks very bland as is – color wise – but the design is as beautiful as it gets for the early 50’s….
I was wondering how someone could put a price on this rarity…but looks like someone did.
“Get low monthly payments” I’m guessing at least $50,000 a month?
What’s under the bonnet? 331 Hemi????
Beautiful car, I never knew these were series produced, even in limited numbers. Unfortunately, I can barely afford their much cheaper ” cousin “, the Karmann Ghia.
Might be striking in medium/light grey, or if originality wasn’t a concern, a medium charcoal.
Lots of design hints from this model found their way into the recent crops of Chrysler 300’s
The door and the rear side window resemble the Karmann Ghia .
Has a little bit of a Nash Healey look to it.
It has a little bit of a Nash healey look to it.
Or a much nicer Kaiser Darrin…
“We accept the following payment methods:
– Cash (in person.)”
Let me just dust off my Sonny Crockett aluminum briefcase, oil up the handcuff and I’ll meet you behind the Dairy Queen.
Beautiful and unique.
Leave it to you, Scotty, to find another unique and gorgeous automobile.
The design, both outside and in, is incredibly beautiful – from all angles.
I think that I may need just a couple of more of those stimulus check things so that I can snag this one.Thank you the rest of society!!
The Italians gave us several decades of Chrysler grilles, as well as the fenders of the 55 and 56 Imperials, and the slim Chrome bumperettes on the fender ends later seen on Imperials.
Chrysler commissioned a number of striking and influential cars from Ghia in the ’50s. The Norseman which went down on the Andrea Doria in 1956 foretold the first fastback Dodge Chargers
WOW! What a great car, I love it. I can understand their are a few unknowns from the sellers description and photos, but guess what ,I live in Phoenix. No problem , I might run over this afternoon and take a quick look, and if it checks out, I might make a counter offer.
Counter with $549k just to piss the seller off.
Grew up in a little community on the NW Oregon coast. A genuinely wealthy and very nice couple in the early ‘60’s had a Ghia, a Dual Ghia, a Jaguar XK150 (concours condition), a white Rolls Royce convertible and a Volvo wagon for the grocery getter. Made a lifetime car enthusiast out of me!
Wouldn’t take a lot to make this a 100 point car ……
Wouldn’t take alot? Just a half a mill to start and another quarter mill to restore it. That puts you into at about 3/4 of a mill. For a 400000 dollar car. Na not much at all. I think go down to local dealer and buy a new Chrysler 300 in white and you basically have the same looking pos. Save yourself 5/8 of a million dollars! Lol.
the ebay lists it as ‘preserved’ but they admit to a repaint / reupholster in its past. It is in need of a restore for that price. but hey, i’m just a poor boy
That body putty may be the coachbuilder’s. I read in a Hemmings Special Interest Autos or Sports and Exotic Cars (both RIP) outlining the Restoration of a Dual Ghia that 1/4″ inch of builder putty was encountered. A Peterson publication on body repair and fabrication stated in 1971 that European custom bodies were “strictly second rate.” When I visited the Brooks Stevens Museum in 1985 to see the Talbot Lago teardrop coupe, I was amazed how wavy the body panels were. (every one of them) It’s possible that this was due to a severe transport accident but any bodyman with bondo and a squeege could have made for a much straighter car. So I wouldn’t be surprised that the body imperfections are builder flaws as opposed to bad repairs.
well, with the comment of Richard I have to disagree,sorry.
The car we restore now had almost NO ” bondo” except on a spot where at some stage a light accident was repaired .
Panels are close to perfect ,weldings very nice and fine .The Ghia cars I have seen over the years most of the time were very nicely build .Same for ( most !) Pininfarina .In almost all cases of Italian period coachbuilding la bella figura was more important than the structure one could not see anyway …
Especially the best of them all, Carr. Touring and Zagato , were known for this .Outside a most perfect and almost symmetrical body . Under the skin, sometimes outright horrible and most of the time bad….. And lots of corrosion because of NO treatment of the metal at all!
Outside, a so perfect skin that only a minor amount of tin or plaster was needed to finish …
I totally agree with Mr Bruce.
Chrome trim is of an outstanding quality ,but a bit heavy..
Anecdote : why should these cars be on Marchall headlights ?
Because they were sold via the Chrysler import in France ..
The car we now restore came from its original country where sold, France, ( Societé France Motors) , via Switserland to Italy .There it slept for almost 5 decades . Inherited two years ago ,still in the same family.
We hope to present this car at Pebble.
Its a big car, but the proportions are ,in my opinion, perfect .
Same as for the 300 series !
S.
I am very familiar with one of the supposed “7” that were made. The Red and cream colored one that was the New York City Show Car It was the one I saw restored. It was purchased by a Venezuelan Oil magnet who at one time wrecked the passengers side front end and fender. There was a shop headed by a Mr. Brian Haupt called Carriage and Motor Works in Kansas City area that restored it. That may be the car sold in St. Louis. There were limited changes on most of the cars in terms of external and internal trim as well as colors. Talking with Mr. Haupt he stated that none of these were exactly alike. He has many hundreds of photos of the one he restored from the car when it arrived to the show in California. He was proud of his work as he should have been it was magnificent when completed in a deep Dark Red and Smooth very light Tan cream color. Chrome perfect including the new front bumper that needed to be made.
The comments that it looks like a Karminn Ghia is true but on Steroids, LOTS of Steroids. As for the builders putty, the shop totally stripped the car and the only putty we found was where the the shop put on putty on the front fender after the wreck. Carriage and Motor Works fabricated everything to as new from fresh sheet metal from the center line of the hood to the front of the passengers side door. This was done on an English Wheel and in butt welded segments, including the bumper. That car was shown at the Pebble Beach show and was given and Excellent restoration comment.
Of note like some other cars including some pre war Jaguars the center line of the car is offset to the passengers side. Look closely at the photos and you will see this offset. The interior is just as amazing at the rest of the car. The instruments behind the steering wheel were huge as compared to modern cars.
The workmanship of the chassis, the body and the interior were of top quality as were the materials. Chrome was thick and butter smooth. It was an impressive car from so many ways. I wish that the styling had had a bigger impact on the on the rest of the Chrysler line. It would have been amazing competition to the Ford Thunderbird even at the size it was.
Looks a lot like the chrysler concept car that was stowed and went down with the adrea dorie cruise ship
Not really, to me at least. The Andrea Dorea sunken treasure Norseman foretold mopars like 1961 Phoenix, maybe some latter Dodge Charger in the rear window, and SURPRISE! A little AMC Marlin with the window sweep and sail panel treatment.
whats the vertical strip at each corner? Some chrome? Below a turn signal? Are those bumperettes?
I seem to recall that a number of Ghia-Chrysler concept cars went down with the Andrea Doria….
Only the Norseman ; it was stored in the front hold of the ship.
Regardless of the faults mentioned,this is still a very beautiful car.If I could ,I would snatch this beauty in a minute but I don’t have that kind of cash laying around. This would definitely get some attention at a car show,it would mine.
Only the Norseman ; it was stored in the front hold of the ship.