#bugatti type 57

[les-belles-mecaniques]

La légendaire Bugatti Type 57 de 1937

[nicholask-la]

From February, 2025

[mensfactory]

Bugatti 'Aerolithe'

Only four Type 57 Atlantic Coupes were ever produced by Bugatti. One of them went to Parisian entrepreneur Jacques Holzshuh, before meeting its end on a railway crossing. Another was delivered new to Baron Victor Rothschild and is owned today by American collector Peter Mullin. A third is currently in the hands of Ralph Lauren, while the fourth? Nobody knows. One of the great mysteries of the car world is the whereabouts of ‘La Voiture Noire’: Jean Bugatti’s very own Type 57 Atlantic.

But the car that previewed the lot of them is the one above. Sort of. It’s a rebodied, restored Bugatti ‘Aerolithe’; a prototype first shown off at the 1935 Paris Motor Show.

A man named David Grainger from The Guild of Automotive Restoration was commissioned to recreate the car that paved the way for the most famous pre-war car ever built. He had the original chassis of the Aerolithe – number 57104 – as well as its original 3.3-litre eight-cylinder engine, and rear axle. But no body.

Indeed, David’s team at The Guild had but 11 photos to work from… and had to adhere to coachbuilding standards of the day. Which means they had to fashion the body from magnesium, which is – by all accounts – incredibly difficult to work with. They spent years riveting and shaping the panels into that simply gorgeous Aerolithe form.

[artdecoandmodernist]

Bugatti Type 57 Grand Raid Roadster, 1935

[sepiadays]

Reproduction of the 1935 Bugatti Aerolithe - the brainchild of Ettore Bugatti’s son, Jean, it combined the Type 57′s 170-hp straight-eight power with state-of-the-art riveted Elektron coachwork.

[luimartins]

Wimille-Benois Bugatti Type 57 Le Mans 1937

[mote-historie]

Bugatti Type 57SC Atlantic Coupé, 1936.

Ralph Lauren Car Collection.

[les-belles-mecaniques]

1930 Bugatti Type 57 Cabriolet