Car of the Week: This Maserati Spider Is One of the Marque’s Most Collectible Cars, and It’s Up for Grabs
Maserati was born in Bologna, Italy, on December 1, 1914, four years after the beginning of what would soon become Alfa Romeo, and a full 15 years after FIAT came on the scene. It was an exciting time of motorsport competition, decades before such things as series-production road cars transformed all three names into full-fledged manufacturers. The first Maserati generally acknowledged as a bona fide production model was the 1957 3500 GT, a beautiful coupe with a body by Touring of Milan and powered by Maserati’s well-proven 3.5-liter, inline-six engine.
The year 1957 also coincided with Maserati’s decision to hang up its racing gloves after Juan Manuel Fangio became the Formula 1 champion in a Maserati 250F. The shift away from motorsport opened the factory doors to the production of luxury road cars. The sporting new GT had real credentials, its 217 hp mill being a road-tuned version of the one used in Maserati’s 350S race cars, with an aluminum block and heads, twin-plug ignition, and Weber carburetors—all exotic stuff that would prove surprisingly tractable on real-world roads.
Italy’s scenic motorways—and those in other parts of Europe and America—called for a proper open-top car, and another Italian coachbuilder, Vignale, was awarded the contract to produce a Maserati convertible based on the same 3500 GT drivetrain, but with a shorter wheelbase and an even more sporting demeanor.
The elegant, reserved shape was penned by Giovanni Michelotti, author of many highly esteemed designs, among which the 3500 GT Spider is one of his finest. Revealed at the 1959 Paris Auto Salon, the Vignale-bodied Spider features an enduring form that’s a testament to the virtues of understatement and classic proportions, and today the model is one of the most collectible of all Maserati road cars.
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It is precisely the classic lines and pleasant road manners of the 3500 GT, along with its rarified racing pedigree and exclusivity, that brought the company such success during its formative postwar years—the same time when other European luxury manufacturers were making inroads into markets far beyond their domestic borders. For Maserati, the 3500 series was a success by any measure, with more than 2,200 coupes and convertibles made through 1963, when the Sebring and Mistral took over, followed by the debut of the inimitable Ghibli in 1966. While the Touring-bodied 3500 GT and GTI coupes comprised the lion’s share of production, a mere 242 examples of the 3500 GT Spider by Vignale were built, making it the cream of the Maserati 3500 crop.
This specific car, from the second year of production, was completed on July 21, 1960. Chassis No. 101975 was delivered to Amelia Olsen Riis, the wife of the Honorary Consul and Olympic attaché for Norway, who was serving during the 1960 Rome Summer Olympics. The vehicle came to California by 1964, and was acquired by the consignor in 2014 after spending decades stored in Texas.
Maserati specialist Martin Loge’s JML Restorations undertook a ground-up refurbishment. Nearly a decade on, the car was entrusted to Joseph DeMeo and his team for further refinements. DeMeo’s attention to details that distinguish Best-in-Show contenders from the rest earned the car first place at the 2017 Greystone Mansion Concours. That accolade was followed up by both a second-place award and the Timeless Elegance Award at the 2023 La Jolla Concours.
This Maserati will be offered through Gooding & Company during its 2023 Pebble Beach Auctions event, being held August 18 and 19. With an estimated value between $750,000 and $900,000, the car is a compelling alternative—or stablemate—to Mercedes-Benz’s 300 SL Roadster or a Jaguar E-Type. Come to think of it, why not one each of the era’s greatest sporting convertibles?
Click here for more photos of this 1960 Maserati 3500 GT Spider.
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