White; a colour that symbolises purity, cleanliness, and spirituality. It also happened to be the theme for this month’s Daikanyama T-Site Morning Cruise. As it was a colour theme, the cars that showed up were varied and only had their paint job in common.
Although the T-Site car park looked as white as an American Republican dinner party, it was infinitely more diverse. Every single genre was covered from hot hatches to supercars, classics to family cars, and a healthy dosage of JDM goodness thrown in too. This meet was easily on of my favourites.
The highlight was undoubtedly the F40. Not only because it was the first time I’d seen one in white, but also because it made a damn nice noise as it left the meet rather early on in the morning. The F40 commanded a sort of superstar presence among the crowd, as it left all eyes were stuck to it. It may have been white but was anything other than ‘pure’. Pure filth, perhaps.
Continuing white Ferraris, the F430 Spider was a delight. Not everyone’s favourite Prancing Horse, the F430 holds a special place in my heart. It was a car 12 year old me lusted after. Parked next to it was an equally white and equally Italian Maserati Spyder. Seeing these two next to each other brought back memories of 2005 and seeing photos of these two in magazines.
More European cars included two of my favourite “family cars” next to each other; a C63 AMG and Maserati Quattroporte GTS. Who needs a supercharged Range Rover when either one of these can carry the same number of people in more style and more pace. I do adore these two but wouldn’t be able to decide which one to have. As that child in those El Paso adverts said, “why not have both”?
The two BMW coupes E92 M3 and E9 3.0CS, was a great comparison of the differences in design over the 30-odd years separating the two. Well okay, technically the modern equivalent to the CS would be a 6-Series and not a M3, but it still had the kidney grille and Hofmeister kink.
Elsewhere in the car park was a properly looked after E30 M3, in white of course. It was parked in between two modern German cars, a Merc CLA and Audi A8, and in comparison the M3 looked tiny. Which only made me want one even more. Speaking of tiny, the Alfa Romeo Junior Zagato, as seen in the Alfa meet, looked as petite and pretty as ever.
Porsches were well covered too. The usual 911s were there, a 993 Carrera, 996 GT3, and the creme-de-la-creme of 911s, the GT3 RS 4.0. But even that had to play second place to the 550 Spyder. I can’t vouch for its authenticity but it did look pretty damn convincingly original. This particular car was a member of the Porsche Club of America and had a sticker from ‘Competition Motors’, a dealership in California who originally sold these in the 50s.
As I mentioned earlier there was a lot of variety, so it wasn’t just fancy Ferraris and pretty Porsches. There were some down to earth heroes too. The RenaultSport Megane RS275 Trophy-R, one of 250 in the world, was a great thing to see. Knowing this thing was capable of going around the Nurburgring in record time sent chills down my spine. I wanted to have a go in it desperately.
Another Renault there was the hilariously named ‘Wind’. The Twingo-based convertible is a model we don’t get in NZ, probably because of the jokes the name would attract, but it’s quite an attractive looking thing in a cutesy sort of way.
The BBS-wheeled VW Scirocco R reminded how good these things look and that these are now pretty affordable on the used market. There was also a GTI Convertible, a car you don’t see very often. I’m not sure what kind of person wakes up and ‘wants’ to get a convertible Golf GTI, but there you go.
Some might know about my irrational fondness for anything with an Abarth badge and my Abarth fanboy self was not disappointed. A Punto Evo Abarth, with one of the coolest wheels in the world, kicked things off nicely. Then came the Abarth 500, new and old. Normally I’d rush over to the new 500 like an excitable puppy but I noticed a crowd of elderly gentlemen around the classic. Then I saw why.
This was no ordinary ‘Bambina’, this was an Abarth with a Japanese heart. Or to be more precise, a 1600cc Honda VTEC engine. As the original car had 600cc, this had 1000cc more so the engine had to placed in the middle of the car, where the back seats are usually found. In essence, this is a miniature version of the Renault Clio V6.
The Honda-engined Abarth leads me nicely to the next car, a Honda CR-X. Pretty little thing isn’t it? If only the current CR-Z had some of this car’s charm. Another charming little Japanese car was the enthusiastically stickered-up Toyota Sprinter. It won me over with those flared arches though.
At the back of the car park was a lineup to make any JDM fan happy. A R34 GT-R, a wingless Evo X, a NA MX-5, and a R31 Skyline GT – all in white. On the other side of the carpark was a Datsun Bluebird parked next to its successor, the R35 GT-R.
Some oddballs at the meet was the Ford F150 SVT Lightning. This raised many questions as to why there was one in Japan in the first place and what use could anyone possibly have for it in the middle of Tokyo? The Lotus Cortina was a lovely beaut of a thing, as well the two Morris Minors. There was also an AMC Rebel, a car I had never heard of before.
Although the theme was white, some people still came in more colourful cars. A convoy of Ferraris, including a red Testarossa and a blue 550 Maranello, showed up. The was a fantastic widebody Rover Mini in a purpley/blue colour. A grey 997 GT3 with red stickers similar to that on an RS showed up too, and he clearly wanted a RS badly. He was looking at the 4.0 the same way I look at a steak.
The white theme was certainly a fun and unique one. It was great to see all the variety of cars while at the same time seeing the all the different ways white can be done on a car. Off-white, cream, sold white, pearl white, white with red, white with blue… I can only imagine what it would’ve looked like from an aerial view. Probably like a sea of rice.
