Practical Classics Restoration Show
Now established as the opening salvo of the British show season, the Practical Classics Classic Car & Restoration Show with Discovery celebrated the grimy and grotty, plus the pristine and perfect
You can sometimes have too much of a good thing. And at other shows, that’s fine – with their displays of lovely-looking vehicles, restored or otherwise, with shiny chrome and polished paintwork. But the Practical Classics Classic Car and Restoration Show with Discovery has a different and rather refreshing focus; it’s just as much about finding and resurrecting cars as it is about older vehicles that are already up-and-running.
So, for the duration of the threeday show last weekend, multiple halls of Birmingham’s cavernous NEC effectively became a giant workshop, with 159 car clubs showing off – and working on – more than 1000 classics, from those that have been practically untouched since being dragged out of barns, through to finished cars. That’s what truly made makes this event stand out – much of what was there wasn’t just static and lifeless but having minor and major jobs done to it – and when you see cars with their bodies being removed and engines being rebuilt, you know it’s a lot more than just mere tinkering.
Throw in the Live Stage, hosted by our colleagues from sister publication, Practical Classics, workshop demonstrations, spring’s largest indoor autojumble and trader village, a gloriously motley collection of barn find classics, Sporting Bears Dream Rides, celebrities and a 200lot auction, and it was easy to see why this show revels in all aspects of the classic car hobby. Get 2019’s event, being held on 22-24 March, into your diary now.