Among the most elegant bodies crafted on the Bentley S1 chassis was H.J. Mulliner’s beautifully proportioned drophead coupe, style number 7409, with its subtle flow-through fender lines and minimal lack of decoration resulting in a car of very simple but classic lines. It was a genuinely attractive automobile in the purest design sense, and unlike most Bentley convertibles of this era, when the factory was moving toward “adaptations” that were built using converted sedan body panels, each was a truly full custom creation, built by Mulliner’s artisans from the floor up.

Only twelve examples of design no. 7409 were built on the standard S1 chassis, and chassis number B122LFA, offered here, was one of just five with left-hand-drive. In addition, it was the third-from-last and as an FA-series chassis was built to the most developed late production specification, with all of the running improvements made to the six-cylinder S1 over its run, as well as the newly popular automatic transmission.

The car was originally delivered in May 1958 to Edith du Pont Riegel, great-great-great-great-granddaughter of DuPont Company founder E.I. du Pont, and herself a highly active socialite and philanthropist in her native Delaware and elsewhere on the East Coast. Members of the du Pont family were great enthusiasts of Rolls-Royce and Bentley, acquiring numerous significant coachbuilt examples. Mrs. Riegel’s son, Richard “Jerry” Riegel, would become a noted collector and enthusiast whose stable included several of the family’s own Du Pont automobiles and the famous “Tulipwood” Hispano-Suiza, and her grandson, Dicky Riegel, now serves as president and CEO of Lime Rock Park.

Chassis number B122LFA was retained by Mrs. Riegel until October 1960, then was traded back to New York dealer J.S. Inskip. It was resold the following January to Robert Motherwell, the abstract expressionist painter of the New York School, who was considered “the leading spokesman for avant-garde art in America” and whose own works now hang in the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, and Tate Modern. Inskip’s ownership records note his address as 173 East 94th Street, the Carnegie Hill brownstone that served as the artist’s home and studio for over a decade.

Later in the 1960s, chassis number B122LFA was acquired by William J. Williams of Cincinnati, Ohio. Mr. Williams was the chairman of Western and Southern Insurance and later a co-owner of the Cincinnati Reds, and his family, like the du Ponts, had been prominent customers of Rolls-Royce since the late 1920s, acquiring numerous special coachbuilt examples most prominently in the Springfield era. The car likely remained in Cincinnati well into the 1970s, as in early 1976 it was in the ownership of another local collector, Joseph Levin, who reported it in “mint condition with 28,000 miles.” Mr. Levin retained the car until 1983, after which it became part of the large Rolls-Royce and Bentley collection of John Cory in New Jersey.

In early 1990 the car was acquired by its present owners, whose collection is among the very finest gatherings of coachbuilt postwar Rolls-Royce and Bentley automobiles, through the auspices of Miami restoration firm Vantage Motorworks, which shortly restored the Bentley to its present livery, a dramatic pale silver metallic with red leather interior and top. It has since remained in the collection for the past 36 years, and in that time has been very selectively shown, largely remaining well-preserved and conserved within the collection’s halls.

Extraordinarily rare compared to other S-series Bentleys of its era, even vaunted coachbuilt creations, this especially beautiful car is one of but five like it built on left-hand-drive chassis, and has a wonderful known history with important enthusiast families. It has much to recommend it to the next connoisseur in its rich history.