Aerosport 'Babe' heading for Autoretro

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When you look at today's Friday lady you see a woman proud of her stylish Art Deco outfit (with expensive Lempicka-esque driving gloves) and you see a car proudly wearing coachwork by Letourneur & Marchand. Not just a car but a 1934 Delage 'Aerosport'. Having learned their trade with other coachbuilders, Letourneur and Marchand started up on their own in 1905 doing contract work for other coachbuilders and a few complete bodies for manufacturers like Darracq and by the time WW1 broke out they had built 1228 bodies.

The 1920s saw successful expansion and Delage became their first big customer with a run of 2, 000 bodies for the DI chassis. Letourneur's son Marcel finished his training with an English coachbuilder and joined the company in 1928. They built a series of aerodynamic 'coaches profilés' which pushed the pillarless look to its aesthetic limits - culminating in this 1938 'Coach JELM', also known as 'Coupe Panoramique', or commonly called the 'Yo-Yo car' from the Art Deco accent line on its body and its hallmark sweeping sidelight extending from door into the rear quarter, with overlapping glass and no center pillar.

But let's return to the 'Aerosport' and the lady posing beside it (she's not the only one). Our friends at Autodromo magazine have chosen this picture for the front cover of issue #13(to be presented at the early December Autoretro show) and tell us that the Delage importers entered the car in the 1934 Concours d'Elegance at Barcelona's Polo Jockey Club. Her fashion reminds us more of Austria than Spain, but those shoes trigger an imagination of her changing after a hard day's modeling and heading out to her favourite bar for a hard night's flamenco dancing!

(Text Robin Batchelor, photo courtesy Autodromo)

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