Richard Adatto is a world-renowned expert on French aerodynamic cars. He has been a judge at numerous concours d’elegance around the world, including the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, and he is an international prize-winning author of and contributor to multiple automotive books, magazines, and journals. Richard’s love of cars began in San Francisco in 1979. A professional crewman for competitive racing sailboats, Richard was in the City by the Bay to board his next vessel, but fortunately, he quite literally missed the boat. Tired of helming other people’s toys, he decided to take advantage of opportunity. The International Auto Show was taking place in San Francisco that weekend; Richard attended, saw his first Delahaye, and immediately fell in love with the marque. He purchased the car and soon became one of the first people to race vintage cars in the Pacific Northwest.
Since that time, Richard has personally restored three Delahayes and one Talbot-Lago, another famous French marque, and has been involved in many other restorations in an advisory capacity. He has gained intimate knowledge of such cars’ inner workings, and has driven his Delahayes in numerous rallies, including the Monte Carlo Rally. Richard’s passion for classic cars has led to long-term friendships with some of France’s most well-established coachbuilders, permitting him to fully understand and appreciate automotive styling and design, and the inspirations from which they spring.
Richard is a resident of Seattle, Washington, but he travels internationally helping car collectors assess and appraise potential acquisitions. He has traveled to England, Japan, France, and numerous other locales pursuing the beauty of the automobile. Richard has also written and co-authored numerous books, including From Passion to Perfection, Delage Styling and Design, Curves of Steel, Delahaye Styling and Design, The Art of Bugatti, and French Curves.
Richard Adatto has written and co-authored the following books on French coachbuilders and streamlined automobile design.
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A comprehensive celebration of Joseph Figoni’s artistic contributions to automotive design, tracing his creative process through pen and pencil drawings alongside modern restorations of more than fifty Figoni-bodied Delahayes. Personal accounts from Claude Figoni and Richard Adatto’s own recollections of locating lost cars and working with restorers round out the history, with an appendix of Joseph Figoni’s original design drawings, many previously unpublished.
From its earliest moments in Paris to the 18th Fairway at Pebble Beach, from Blenheim Palace in England and on to the Far East, the Concours d’Elegance has long been the pedestal upon which the collector car world has placed its automotive idols.
Delahaye, Delage, Talbot-Lago is the second in a series of titles featuring great French cars. These three grand marques, as presented in French Curves, are the epitome of wonderful French design combined with imaginative technological innovation.
A glorious testament to French design in the 20th century, spanning touring and competition cars from the greatest marques, including Delahaye, Delage, Voisin, Hispano Suiza, Peugeot, and Talbot-Lago.
General Motors has been a world leader in automotive design for 100 years. No other large-scale manufacturer has put such energy and resources into creating cars that are as beautiful, colorful, and forward-thinking.
A 192-page companion book to the Phoenix Art Museum’s exhibition “Curves of Steel – Streamlined Automobile Design,” which ran from April 1 through June 3, 2007. Features more than 200 color photographs by world-renowned automotive photographer Michael Furman and contributors Richard Adatto and Diana Meredith, with a world-class team of automotive writers, designers, and historians.
The Story of French Streamlined Styling 1930–1939. Collectible edition, English language.
Celebrates the extraordinary coachwork produced on the Delahaye chassis between 1920 and the early 1950s, richly illustrated with color and black-and-white photographs.
Introduces Delage, an art deco French car favored by the rich and famous during the inter-war years, and traces its styling and design by French coachbuilders including Letourneur & Marchand, Henri Chapron, Marcel Pourtout, and Figoni & Falaschi.
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