These four rare classics are seriously cool

1964 Apollo 5000GT, £130-170,000

Looking a little like a coming together between a ‘60s Ferrari and a fixed-head Jaguar E-type, the Apollo GT is an American-Italian hybrid and as rare as cars get.

The long bonnet and short fastback tail may be a long way from the Jaguar’s svelte beauty, but the shape was refined by no less a maestro than Franco Scaglione. It certainly has its good angles, particularly around that Ferrari-like nose with its split chrome bumpers. And in terms of detailing, it’s Italian quality at its best.

The Apollo was the idea of two American enthusiasts to combine home-grown muscle car mechanicals with Italian craftsmanship – a project with a parallel with our own Cobra. The Apollo’s steel shell, coachbuilt in Italy by Frank Reisner, the founder of Intermeccanica, was shipped to California where it was fitted with the oily bits: a GM V8 with 250PS (186kW), a four-on-the-floor transmission and independent suspension. The car would do 130mph or more.

The GT in the sale, previously owned by Apollo founder Milt Brown and with just 4,000 miles from new, is the second to the last of the 76 cars built, one of the few made in 5.0-litre 5000GT form – and one of even fewer Apollo GTs that survive today.

1970 Yenko Deuce, £99,000-120,000

What a name, what a paint job and what a spec: V8, 360PS (268kW), live rear axle and drum brakes! As Bonhams says, burnouts are hard to avoid…

It’s among the US’s rarest and most sought-after muscle cars, a real wolf in sheep’s clothing – or would be without the Starsky and Hutch-style white racing stripes.

It’s a Chevy Nova in reality but this is the hottest Nova ever and the brainchild of Chevy dealer Don Yenko. With his tuned-up Camaros, the Yenko name was already well known in North American performance car circles, and the Yenko Deuce built on that success – with Chevy’s blessing.

One hundred and seventy five were built, all with sports suspension and the LT/1 engine upgrade for the 350 cubic inch (5.7-litre) Turbo-Fire V8. The interior is still all black vinyl and the dashboard is hardly sporting, but don’t you just love the tachometer? That’s the stick-on pod outside the car on the bonnet!

1984 Pininfarina Spidereuropa, £37-44,000

Okay so it’s a Fiat 124 Spider, that much is obvious. But while 124 Spiders were massively popular in the US, a car like this was never sold there, and even in Europe was as rare as hen’s teeth.

For one thing it’s a Pininfarina not a Fiat. Fiat stopped making the Spider in 1981 which is when the coachbuilder (and designer of the car) took over with a limited production run which lasted until 1986. Pininfarina called the European version Spidereuropa and gave it a styling refresh along with Abarth-tuned engine and suspension.

This car is even rarer because it is the supercharged Volumex version. In its day the Volumex was sold only in Germany and cost a third more than the regular model. With a supercharger boosting the Lampredi-designed 2.0-litre twin-cam engine, coil sprung suspension, disc brakes all round and five-speed manual gearbox, a Spidereuropa Volumex is the ultimate 124 Spider – in the US or anywhere else.

1967 OSI 20M TS, £44-59,000

Before the Ford Capri was the OSI. Nope, as names go, it’s not as catchy. Nor was it anything like as successful – only around 2,000 of the Ford coupes were ever made, and just 200 or so are thought to exist today. But it’s quite a classy looking thing, with its quad round headlights, smart wire wheels and fastback tail with Mustang-style gills in the rear quarters. Squint and the profile is a little Ferrari-like.

True to form, it’s an Italian design. Coachbuilder Ghia came up with it, in response to a Ford commission for a four-seat coupe based on the Taunus sedan and powered by the Ford Cologne V6. After being displayed on the Ford stand at the Geneva show in 1966, it went into limited, hand-built production at Officine Stampaggi Industriali – OSI – which Ghia had set up as a manufacturing centre next door to its design studio in Turin.

It was only ever sold in Germany, and then only until 1969, when the Capri came out. But turn up at a Blue Oval meet in this today and you’d surely be the talk of the town.

Images courtesy of Bonhams.