Meet the £1.5m BMW roadster

The BMW i8 is Top Gear magazine's Car of the Year 2014. It's brilliant. One of the defining reasons why it changes fast cars forever is down to its effortless cool.

Well, here's another fast BMW that costs plenty more than the i8, but - in our eyes at least - is also creeping on sub-zero levels of cool. It's the BMW 507, and it's coming up for auction this weekend.

Sure, the Mercedes-Benz SL of the same era - that's the 1950s - continues to garner most of the attention, but BMW's little roadster is all sorts of excellent in its own right. It's got a lightweight alloy body, a 3.2-litre alloy V8 engine slung up front, driving the rear wheels through a four-speed manual gearbox, and independent suspension. Well, at the front, anyhow; there's a live rear axle.

Even with that - and the lowly 160bhp on offer - you have to admit this is one of BMW's finest ever designs. This particular example was built in 1959, and spent much of its life in a collection in Switzerland.

In 1997 it changed hands and want to German collector and racer Peter Groh, before being shipped out to California in 1999, and being treated to around $50,000 worth of restoration work in 2003.

The current owner bought this car in 2009, and now, after much money spent on its refurbishment, is ready to be auctioned off at this weekend's Gooding & Company sale in Scottsdale.

It's taking place tomorrow, with a price tag hovering somewhere around the £1.5 million mark. A lot of dough for an old BMW - you can bag an old E46 M3 for around £10k these days - but surely worth it just for the cool factor?

Top Gear's Cars of 2014: the full list