A 29-year-old Ford Capri with 936 miles on the clock has sold for a record £54,000 at a Silverstone auction.
Back in the 1980s, the Ford Capri was the car of choice for boy-racers, yuppies – and Del Boy Trotter. With their c-pillar and sloping rear end, they were stylish, sexy, and different to anything that had come before.
They were also affordable back then, but the 1987 D-registered Capri sold at auction for £54,000 smashes any idea that getting your hands on one of these retro bad boys nowadays won’t put a massive dent in your online bank account.
Indeed, the Capri sold for the same price as a 2015 Jaguar F-Type coupe.
Brief History Of The Ford Capri
The Ford Capri was first conceived at the end of the swinging sixties, before being marketed as the “car you always promised yourself,” in the seventies.
Over time, it became a cultural icon synonymous with a fast-living, money-making yuppie lifestyle, before sightings of it on UK roads became a rarity from the mid-nineties onwards.
Because Ford never had any plans to sell their Mustang in Europe, their idea was for the Capri to act as its European counterpart. Although the Capri can’t hold a candle to the raw, powerful alpha-male meatiness of the Mustang, it managed to look like a typically English version of a boy racer car.
It was slim and lengthy, good-looking and often abrasive. A bit like Michael Caine, if you will.
ITV realised it oozed cool and used one in their popular TV show The Professionals, before Del Boy practically annihilated its sexy image by purchasing a ready-for-scrap, garish lime-green Mark III variant in Only Fools And Horses.
Indeed, Del Boy’s purchase of the hideous, down on its heels Mark III Capri was sadly symbolic, as production came to an end the same year in 1987 after 1.9 million units were sold.
Fast-forward to 2016, and the Capri is now ready to be reborn as an icon.
