A quest concerning the Grand Concours D’Elegance Automobile held in Biarritz, France in September 1931

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One of our subscribers is restoring a 1931 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental that came to the USA from Egypt in the late 1950s. Mounted on the dash was the wonderful art-deco plaque by Fraisse-Demey, which can be seen in the photograph (click to enlarge).

We from PreWarCar.com would like to help him to obtain pictures of the cars and attendees at the 1931 Concours event and newspaper and magazine articles as well as any advertisements, brochures and other published documents. But we can only do this with your help! Besides these documents, we are also looking for information about this event. Which of you can help us answering (one of) the following questions?

1. Who, or which organization sponsored and ran the 1931 Biarritz Concours?
2. What was the location of the event in Biarritz and was a hotel involved?
3. Does a list exist of the cars, owners and fashion houses that participated?
4. Which cars were the award winners?

Some background and clues

The Biarritz Concours held in the preceding year (1930) was a particularly important event because the recipient of the Grand Prix D’Honneur was 26EX, the prototype Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental, entered by the Continental’s designer, Mr H.I.F. (Ivan) Evernden. The resulting excitement and interest in the car was credited with proving the commercial value of the Continental’s short wheelbase, stiff springing and close-coupled design to the executive management of Rolls-Royce.

“Le Chambre d’Amour”

In an article written by Mr Evernden, first published in the December 1960 Rolls-Royce Owners Club magazine “The Flying Lady” there are some clues about the location of the 1930 event. He described taking the car to enter the Concours at “an elysian bathing beach, poetically called “Le Chambre d’Amour”, and there was an “array of large cars in the arena, Rolls-Royce, Isotta-Fraschini, Hispano-Suiza and the like”. He also said that “It is a rule at a French Concours d’Elegance that the car shall be driven by a beautiful young woman” and it was arranged that “Pomposa de Escandon, daughter of the Marquis de Villavieja should drive the car, accompanied by Archduchess Margarita”.

Another famous person who was involved in the 1930 event was Don Carlos de Salamanca, the Rolls-Royce agent in Madrid, winner of the first Spanish Grand Prix in 1913 and a relative of King Alphonso. Evernden states that “in those days the Grandees of Spain ranked among our best customers” and “Royce told Don Carlos that I would take the car to him at his Villa Anglet in Biarritz”, which may have been near the Concours beach. Evernden credits Don Carlos with arranging that his relative, Pomposa, drove the car in the Concours.

Please comment below if you would like to share information concerning the Grand Concours D’Elegance Automobile held in Biarritz, France in September 1931. Do you happen to have extensive information you would like to share with our friend John Campbell? Please send it to [email protected]. Then we will make sure he receives it.

Your help will be highly appreciated.

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