The Landmine-Surviving Bristol with Zagato Coachwork: ‘Eleanor’ Heads to Concours of Elegance 2026

The Concours of Elegance is delighted to confirm that one of the most extraordinary cars in private ownership in Britain today will join this September’s gathering at Hampton Court Palace. ‘Eleanor,’ a 1949 Bristol 400 rebodied by Carrozzeria Zagato, is a car whose survival alone borders on the miraculous.

To understand Eleanor’s significance, a little history is required. The Bristol 400 was the company’s first production car, with just 420 examples built between 1946 and 1950. Bristol Cars at that time was part of the Bristol Aircraft Company, and the engineering thoroughness that characterised the 400 reflected its aviation parentage. But it was what happened next that makes Eleanor so unusual.

In the late 1950s, with Bristol Cars facing closure following a corporate restructuring, the company’s chairman George White and London Bristol dealer Anthony ‘Tony’ Crook stepped in to purchase the business, establishing it as Bristol Cars Ltd.

Crook, a former racing driver with exacting standards and a desire for something lighter and faster than the standard production car, commissioned Zagato of Milan to create a new coupé body for the Bristol 406. The result, the 406Z, was 28cm shorter and 250kg lighter than the factory car, with a top speed of 120mph and a price tag nearly double that of a contemporary Jaguar E-type.

Only six 406Zs were ever built. But Crook, recognising an opportunity, also sent a small batch of earlier Bristol 400 saloons, believed to be three or four in number, to Zagato to be rebodied in the same style. ‘Eleanor’ was one of them.

Originally registered in August 1949 as a standard Bristol 400, she passed through four owners before being acquired by Anthony Crook Motors in early 1960 and dispatched to Milan. There, Zagato gave her their distinctive new body and Crook’s engineers simultaneously upgraded her mechanically, fitting a 2.2-litre Bristol straight-six engine, disc brakes, 406 front suspension and a new gearbox with overdrive.
What followed was a life of almost implausible drama. In the hands of her second post-conversion owner, Eleanor covered more than 200,000 miles, much of it in Libya, where, at some point in her travels, she struck a land mine.

That she survived at all is a testament to the solidity of the structure beneath her Zagato coachwork. She was eventually laid up in the 1980s and remained dormant until 2013, when she emerged as a barn find at auction and passed to her current owner.

What followed was a complete, ground-up restoration, after which Eleanor won her class at the Bristol Owners’ Club Concours d’Elegance in 2017 and went on to star at the Cartier Style et Luxe at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in 2019.

Of the three or four 400Z conversions believed to have been completed, she is the only one currently on the road in the United Kingdom.

Concours of Elegance 2026 takes place at Hampton Court Palace from 4-6 September. Further announcements will follow in the coming months.