This Ferrari Just Made Amelia Island Auction History

Last year, the auto enthusiasts who’d convened for the 2022 Amelia Island auctions witnessed a new record being set at the Gooding & Company sale, with attendees spending a grand total of $69,209,480 on vehicles. The beginning of March brought with it this year’s installment of The Amelia (the new name for the four-day car gathering previously called the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance) — and the 2023 edition of Gooding & Company’s auction managed to eclipse the previous year’s sales, with buyers spending $72,676,188 over the course of the event.

Roughly a quarter of that amount came from a single car, a vehicle that’s also managed to set a record for the highest price ever paid for a vehicle at any of Amelia Island’s many auctions: A 1962 Ferrari 250 GT SWB California Spider sold for the impressive sum of $18,045,000.

There are a number of reasons why this particular Ferrari sold for such a high amount, including scarcity; as this article points out, it’s one of only 37 SWB California Spiders made with covered headlights.

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The firm behind the auction also seemed pleased by the result. “Led by the sale of our star car, and the highest sale of the year thus far, the covered headlamp Ferrari California Spider, we are confident that 2023 will be yet another unprecedented year of success for our company and the market at large,” said David Gooding, founder and president of Gooding & Company, in a statement.

The record-setting California Spider wasn’t the only high-profile Ferrari to make waves at Amelia Island. A 1953 Ferrari 250 MM Spider Series II sold for $3,525,000, while a 1973 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona Spider sold for $2,535,000. All told, 15 of the lots for sale at Gooding & Company’s Amelia Island auction sold for prices in excess of one million dollars. Whether or not you were in the market for a Ferrari, the event was a display of automotive design and engineering at its best.