Article content The 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300SL “Gullwing,” 1948 Tucker “Torpedo,” and 1935 Duesenberg SJ Convertible Coupe in the collection of San Francisco’s Academy of Art University (AAU) have two unique traits in common: they are all exceedingly rare automobiles, easily worth a million dollars each or more; and, strikingly, they all wear shades of maroon or purple. If you want to get technical, the Duesenberg is Dark Garnet Red, the Tucker is Royal Maroon, and the Gullwing was born silver, but restored in Benz’s much-rarer Raspberry Red Metallic; the point is, they’re not the hues in which you typically see these models. “I do like purple, I do like lilac,” says the University’s president, Dr.
Elisa Stephens. “But that Gullwing was [previously] owned by Jenny Craig—that was her colour,” she explains, noting the arguably feminine finish seemed to give pause to several bidders when she bought the car at auction in 2009, scoring her a rather good deal. In fact, Stephens wasn’t closely considering the cars’ colours at all when she acquired them—the plethora of purple in the university’s collection is pure coincidence.
What she was bearing in mind was how each car fit in with – or stood apart from – its contemporaries, aesthetically. “A big portion of the collection is based on styling, and [..
.] changes in style, leaps in design, whether positive or negative.” That’s because half the point of the Academy of Art University’s car col.