Last year Jaguar sold nearly 150,000 cars around the world – the most it ever has in a single year. So what was the big deal made over nine more? We’ll tell you: $17 million.
That’s how much the classic Jag you see here is expected to fetch, give or take a million, under auction at Amelia Island next month. It’s a 1957 Jaguar XKSS, and this will be the first time one will become available in over a decade.
The XKSS, for those unfamiliar, was essentially a road-going version of the D-Type with which Jaguar dominated the 24 Hours of Le Mans three years running from 1955 to 1957. This particular example was delivered new to a customer in the Canadian racing capital of Montreal, and was raced extensively in a shining example of art imitating life imitating art. The current owner picked it up two decades ago, and submitted it to an exhaustive, concours-standard restoration ten years ago.
Captured in the photos below by Brian Henniker for Gooding & Company, XKSS 716 was one of only 16 made before a fire at the factory destroyed the remaining nine chassis that were under construction. Little wonder, with how much Gooding estimates this one to be worth, that Jaguar recently undertook the process of building those last nine examples. (Although Jaguar won’t be charging nearly that much for the additional continuation examples it’s making.)
Based on its $16-18 million pre-sale estimate, this XKSS looks poised to positively eclipse the $7.4 million paid at the Bonhams auction in Arizona last month for a Lightweight E-Type – the other continuation project that Jaguar recently undertook.
The records for both the most expensive Jaguar and the most expensive British car ever sold at auction was set last year when RM Sotheby’s handled a D-Type for over $21 million at Pebble Beach.
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