Car & Classic Magazine – a Retrospective

We write and publish a new, original feature every day in the Car & Classic magazine. Every single day. That’s 7 articles a week, every week. That means by tomorrow we will have written 365 unique features this year, not counting the odd occasion where we got greedy and posted multiple times in a day. That’s an incredible amount of classic content for you all to peruse, from our regular articles like Project Profile and Auction Car of the Week, to broader topics and more specialist essays, we’ve cherished every single word of it. We’ve enjoyed every quoted brake horsepower figure, every questionable pun and all of the brilliant classics we’ve been able to discuss.

Whether it be fighting the corner of a forgotten hero, waxing lyrical about practically anything from the ’80s and ’90s or encouraging you to be more hands on with your own steeds, we bloody love what we do and so we thought we’d take a look back over the past year of the Car & Classic magazine and pick ten of our favourite articles of 2022, in no particular order. With almost 400 to choose from though, it was no mean feat!

1) Platinum Jubilee – Classic Car Fans Flock to Windsor

Back in the spring we were asked to rustle up 70 cars – one for every year of the Queen’s reign – as part of the Jubilee Party in the Park celebrations that happened in June. Not ones to knowingly shy away from a challenge we went full send and amassed a truly wonderful selection of cars in a fitting tribute to the Queen’s 70th year on the throne. Proudly displayed along the Royal Mile leading up to Windsor Castle our collection of classics was an eclectic mix of the best of British. From a Jaguar XJ220 to a Vanden-Plas 1500 we certainly ran the gamut of vintage home-grown metal and the whole event was a huge success, helping to cement Car & Classic’s place as a force to be reckoned with in the classic motoring events calendar.

2) How To – Change Your Oil and Filter

We kicked off a new How To magazine series in March with the intention of encouraging our readers to roll up their sleeves and get down and dirty with their own classics and this particular episode was the very first. We take a hands on approach when it comes to our own classic cars and bikes and so we wanted to show that we practice what we preach, carrying out various servicing and maintenance tasks and passing on that knowledge to you in the form of simple, easy to follow guides. With ten tutorials currently published this series is only going to get bigger in the future, covering a huge range of skills, helping you to be more self-sufficient and savvy with your pride and joy, saving you money in the process. They are so much fun to make too.

3) Project 827

Unless you’ve been hiding under a bush since the summer (much like where we found the car in question) then you can’t possibly have missed our Project 827 build. Our editor, Chris Pollitt, was tipped off about a knackered old Rover that was living in a hedge. Being somewhat of a glutton for punishment (sorry Chris, we mean classic motoring enthusiast) he decided to take it on as a project with the brilliant idea of creating a video series revolving around the car. Well, what followed was an epic tale of redemption and grace as the car is transformed from a rather sorry looking, foliage-dwelling relic to an absolute beauty that’s mintier than a packet of Polos in His Majesty’s Treasury. If this has, in fact, passed you by then we suggest you start with the magazine feature here and then head over to our YouTube channel to binge watch the series in its entirety.

4) Project Purchase

Following on from Chris’ felicitous find and subsequent refurbishment of the Rover we put together a handy magazine article sharing some invaluable information that you would need should you choose to take on a project of your own. Whether it be a forgotten old Ford or a barn find Bugatti the key things you need to consider are enduring, as this article highlights, and we know you lot like a project because our weekly Project Profile series is one of our most popular. Abiding by these proven points will ensure that your chances of success when it comes to restoring a rotter are at their highest and will hopefully inspire you to get out there and rescue a classic that might otherwise not get a second chance.

5) Ain’t Life Grand – Five Classics for £1,000

We have facilitated the buying and selling of some eye-wateringly expensive and specialist classics over the course of the year. From a £206K Maserati 3500GT to Elvis Presley’s very own Cadillac, we put buyers and sellers together to help make classic car dreams a reality, something we will continue to do to an even greater level in 2023 and beyond. But it’s not just the high rollers that we cater to and that diversity and inclusion is what makes Car & Classic so special. We know that not everyone can afford expensive classics, ourselves included (you should see some of our fleet), and that’s why we ensure to cover the widest range possible. That was exactly the train of thought that was behind this particular feature. 1,000 magazine articles was a bit of a milestone for us so we thought we would commemorate it by digging out five classics that you can buy for £1,000. We had a lot of fun with this one.

6) The Joy of the Browse

Which leads us on to our sixth in the list. We spend a large portion of our time browsing the Car & Classic site, as we know you do. It’s not just because we work here, though, oh no. Before any of us came on board we would perennially peruse the Car & Classic site for potential projects, the next dull daily or dream drive and now that we are Europe’s largest classic vehicle market place there’s even more choice in our pursuit of petrolhead perfection. Whether it be via our classifieds, auctions or Verified Listings there is such a bounty of classic metal available for your viewing pleasure it’s almost overwhelming. Almost… It’s a past-time that is perfectly encapsulated by this magazine article and one that we’re sure rings true with most, if not all of you.

7) Tolman 205 GTI – the Ultimate Restomod?

It’s safe to say we love a restomod, as long as it’s done right of course, and that’s exactly what Tolman has done with its update of the iconic Peugeot 205 GTi. An excellent car in its original guise the 205 GTi is hot hatch royalty (another automotive sphere that gets our juices flowing) and any fettling with those beloved lines would be sacrilegious. Which is why we are 100% on board with what Tolman has done: taken a legend and made it even better, without sacrificing what made it such a loveable little car in the first place. We’ve covered not only the topic in general but also numerous restomods throughout 2022, from the Nardone Porsche 928 to the Citroën SM2 and all of them have tickled our collective pickle in at least some form but when we got wind of the Tolman 205 GTi we really sat up and took notice and had to feature it.

8) Ten Questions – Richard Brunning

Another new magazine feature that we debuted at the tail end of 2021 is our Ten Questions series whereby we ask various movers and shakers in the classic and specialist vehicle world, yep, you guessed it, ten questions. This is a chance for us to take a bit of a deeper dive into the grey matter of those like-minded individuals who share our passion for all things car and all things classic. In this particular episode we sat down with Richard Brunning of Bad Obsession Motorsport and Project Binky fame, but it wouldn’t be the last time we get to have a chin wag with our friend and fellow petrolhead. Our new Vodcast series on our YouTube channel is proof of that.

9) Isle Of Man TT – The Ultimate Test

It’s not just our four-wheeled friends that we’re passionate about here at Car & Classic, we love bikes too. And three-wheelers. Basically, if it has an engine and at least one wheel then you can pretty much guarantee that we’ll be into it. We don’t have nearly as much bike content as car content, we know this, but we’re endeavouring to strike more of a balance next year because we know that a lot of you, like us, are bikers and the fuel that runs through our petrol heads is the same for both four wheels as it is for two, which is why we’re including our summary of the Isle of Man TT in this list. At the sharpest edge of motorcycle racing (and arguably motorsport in general) the TT is the ultimate test of man and machine and should be visited at least once by anyone who has even a passing interest in motorbikes. Part of our semi-regular series covering various famous races the TT rightly deserves its place in the upper echelons of motorsport.

10) Mental Health and Classic Motors

Mental health is an incredibly important topic and one that is close to our hearts here at Car & Classic. It’s something that affects everyone to some degree and yet so many of us are unwilling to admit that there is a problem or to discuss it in a normalised manner. Whether that be through some perceived notion of weakness, or shame, it’s sadly the way it is at the moment and that needs to change. We need to know that it’s OK to not be OK and to talk about it openly and that’s what we tried to do, in some small part, by writing this valuable article for the magazine. It takes courage to speak about any deficiencies we feel we might have but the classic community is such a wonderfully positive and healthy place that we can all utilise to help us begin to open up about such issues. Bravo Chris for being so honest and sharing.