On our way up to Switzerland we broke our journey in Mulhouse, staying two nights so we could visit the (rightly) celebrated Cité de l'Automobile. Based on the extensive collection of the brothers Schlumph, but now the national car collection of France, it claims to be the world's largest car collection.
Bugatti type 35B biplace, 1927. Mmmmmmmm, classy...
Having been to a few car collections in my time I can see no reason to doubt it - it's enormous! Being based in the old woollen weaving mill of the Schlumph brothers they have plenty of space, with 2 hectares (about 5 acres) of factory onder one roof.
A Bugatti pickup truck, used in the Schlumph factory
The collection contains 123 Bugattis, the largest collection of the marque in the world, and the obsession that finally ruined the business. (You can read about "the Schlumph affair" here)
It's not all Bugattis: A Fiat 508 S roadster of 1936
The grey and black Citroen Traction Avant is a 7A of 1934.
What you can almostsee behind it is a Traction Avant 11B of 1953 - Celestine's twin sister
We had a great time at the museum, which is a properly curated collection, with a couple of display spaces for special exhibitions. It also has a very fine cafeteria selling good meals at extremely reasonable prices. What's not to like?
3 comments:
Interestingly after looking at the pictures first the building reminded me of the old Lancashire textile mills with the northern lights... I then read the text!! It is a fine collection.
Yes it is very obviously an old textile mill.
Oh dear.... I know where we are going on our next holiday. We've been close to and bypassed Mulhouse.... now we have to visit !
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