1964 Studebaker Avanti Sport Coupe

The Avanti was developed under the direction of Studebaker president Sherwood Egbert. It is said that the car's design theme was the result of sketches Egbert 'doodled' on a flight west from Chicago 37 days after becoming president of Studebaker in 1961. The car was then designed by Raymond Loewy's team during a 40-day crash program.

The Avanti features a radical fiberglass body mounted on a modified 109-inch wheelbase Studebaker Lark chassis. It is powered by a high-performance 289 cubic-inch Studebaker Hawk engine.

The story is told that the stylists finished a clay model with two different sides: one a two-place sports car, the other a four-seat GT coupe in just eight days. Tom Kellogg, a young California stylist hired for this project by Loewy, felt that it should be a four-seat coupe. Loewy envisioned a low-slung, long-hood/short-deck semi-fastback coupe with a wasp-waisted curvature to the rear fenders, inspired by supersonic aircraft.

The Avanti's complex body shape would have been both challenging and prohibitively expensive to build in steel, so the choice was made to produce it in fiberglass.

The owner of this car saw his first Avanti when he was in high school, and it left quite an impression. He is the second owner, and he has restored the car only as needed.