Consulting

For more than four decades Richard Adatto has studied, acquired, raced, and restored the French automobiles of the 1930s through the 1950s, and has spent as long researching the coachbuilders who bodied them: Figoni et Falaschi, Saoutchik, Chapron, Pourtout, Franay. He is the author or co-author of eight books on French automotive design, has judged at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance for over thirty years, and sits on the selection committees at Pebble Beach and Salon Privé. His work has supported museum exhibitions including Curves of Steel at the Phoenix Art Museum.

He advises private collectors, museums, and institutions worldwide, traveling to England, France, Japan, and wherever else a car happens to be. French cars of the classic era remain his particular expertise, but he consults on other marques as well.

Pre-Purchase Assessment

Richard travels to view prospective acquisitions in person. He evaluates condition, originality, and the quality of previous restoration work, then reports on what a car actually is rather than what it is represented to be. Clients get a candid assessment before funds move, along with the questions worth putting to the seller and an honest view of what the car should be worth in its current state.

Authentication and Provenance Research

Over forty years Richard has assembled a private archive of factory records, coachbuilder drawings, period correspondence, registration documents, and photographs, much of it obtained directly from the families of the men who built these cars. That archive underpins his authentication work: matching chassis and body numbers against original records, tracing ownership from the first sale forward, and distinguishing original coachwork from later re-bodies, replacement bodies, and recreations. Where the documentary record is incomplete, he says so plainly. A car’s history is worth as much as its condition, and a gap in that history is worth knowing about before it surfaces at a concours or an auction.

Restoration Guidance

The difference between a restored car and a correctly restored car is detail that is rarely written down anywhere: the profile of a fender, the finish on a dashboard, the trim a particular coachbuilder used in a particular year. Richard works with owners and with restoration shops to establish what a car left the works looking like, and to hold the project to that standard. He can advise at the outset, review work in progress, or be brought in when a restoration has stalled over a question no one can answer.

Concours Preparation and Collection Strategy

Having judged at Pebble Beach, in the United Kingdom, and in France, Richard knows what a class judge looks for and what a selection committee responds to. He advises owners preparing a car for presentation and counsels collectors on the shape of a collection: what to pursue, what to pass on, and what a given car will mean to the collection ten years from now.

Scope and Terms

Engagements are quoted individually, according to the car, the question, and the travel involved. Richard does not provide appraisals for insurance purposes.

Discretion

Much of Richard’s work is done confidentially, and many of his clients prefer that their holdings and their intentions remain private. He works under non-disclosure agreement as a matter of course and does not discuss clients, cars, or transactions without permission.

Contact

Richard accepts a limited number of engagements. Inquiries are welcome at richard@adattoauto.com. If you are writing about a specific car, it is helpful to include the marque, the chassis number, and what you are hoping to establish.