01 Jun Just When You Think You’ve Seen It All…Bam!

2006 Bugatti Veyron Takes Center Stage in World Car Gallery

Go Big or Go Home! That was our mantra as we prepared the Newport Car Museum for its Grand Opening in June of 2017, and it remains so as we mark our six-year Anniversary in 2023. Having started with 55 cars, we now display over 95 cars at one time and we never stop reconfiguring, re-arranging and adding new models to the Museum’s stunning private collection.

The dramatically styled pearl red-and-black Bugatti Veyron was a June Anniversary addition, a true hypercar that remains one of the fastest production cars in the world with a top speed of over 250 mph. Achieving 1001 horsepower in a racing engine is one thing, but to do so in a reliable, refined, durable, and emissions-legal street configuration is much harder. (The Bugatti was our June Car of the Month, so you can read more about it here.)

After a short hiatus, our shocking magma orange 2014 McLaren P1, successor to the McLaren F1, has been returned to take its own featured position on the World Car Gallery’s center platform. One of the most technically complex cars ever, this limited production plug-in hybrid hypercar is closer to the complexity of an aircraft than a conventional car and is considered part of the Holy Trinity of the top three most powerful cars in the world today. (The Porsche 918 Spyder, which we also have, and the Ferrari LaFerrari are the other two.)

Finally, our beloved jet black 2019 McLaren Senna rounds out the center-stage threesome as one of 500 examples produced to commemorate Ayrton Senna’s success with the McLaren Formula 1 team from 1988 to 1993: victory in 35 races and three Drivers’ Championship titles.

In the world of car collecting there are sports cars, supercars and hypercars. Sports cars can deliver exhilarating handling and precision, but supercars take things to the next level with even lower acceleration times and even higher top speeds.

The distinction between a supercar and a hypercar relies primarily on the latter’s even more impressive performance. Hypercars tend to offer more than 800 horsepower, go from 0 to 60 in under three seconds, and hit top speeds ranging from 215 to 270 miles per hour. Beyond this, enthusiasts may also distinguish a supercar from a hypercar on the basis of each model’s driving feel, engine position, style, and intended market, with hypercars offering a certain extravagance that even supercars can’t match.

By adding the Bugatti, we feel we’ve further defined our kinship with car lovers around the world and perhaps with Ettore Bugatti himself, whose motto was “If comparable, it’s no longer Bugatti.” If comparable, it’s no longer the Newport Car Museum.