Cars as passion
Kyiv hosts the first show of exclusive cars
Kyiv recently hosted an unusual, high-profile Retro and Exotic Moto Show which combined classical retro-classics and modern exclusive supercars from the best world manufacturers. “These categories of cars are equally interesting: both from the professional point of view and from the point of view of emotional charge,” Natalia Khoreva, director of the show, has told The Day. “Since it’s the first show of retro-cars in the country, we tried to represent the best examples of private collections from different parts of Ukraine.”
The organizers say it became clear that Europe has been for a long time captivated by retromania as a specific kind of automobile hobby. One should also mention that not every enthusiast can afford such a passion. However, as it turned out, in order to organize a show of 170 exhibits, there was a sufficient number of car connoisseurs in Ukraine. The auto-magazine Retro& Exotika was the ideological inspirer and organizer of the event.
Among lustrous exhibits one could see different models of famous brands from the last century and nowadays: Maserati, Bentley, Rolls-Royce, Lamborghini, Jaguar, Ferrari, Aston Martin, as well as BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Willys, Opel, Pontiac, Ford, ZIS, and GAZ.
The visitors were in raptures at the sight of Soviet cars of the elite class, such as Chayka, Volga, and the ZIL-115 limousine which transported Volodymyr Shcherbytsky, first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine. You won’t encounter such cars in the street, although the owner of ZIL-115, the motorist Mykhailo Stakhanov from Odesa drives only this car with his family on May 9 every year in dry weather. “The limousine finished the series of the Soviet auto industry, and both its exterior and interior are absolutely original. In 1979 Leonid Brezhnev gave 30 cars like this, two for each first secretary.” The owner says that he has in his collection 10 Soviet-made cars, because such cars are more “native” and closer in spirit.
An automobile master from Kyiv, Volodumyr Shkvyra, represented at the show five Mercedes-Benz cars which attracted perhaps the biggest number of visitors. “This is a passion — not only cars,” said the owner laconically.
After tuning by Donetsk automobile masters, a Volga GAZ-21 turned into a symbiosis of two epochs. The fact is that outside it’s a Volga, but inside it’s a BMW. Precisely such combinations — beauty and power — realize the dreams of the most passionate motorists. For many car owners such transformations are a hobby, but for Oleh Voitenko, director of Donetsk automobile atelier, it is a life-long cause. “From a miner to an auto-designer,” he says. The team of professionals elaborated their own technology which allows combining different cars in one.
