’55 Lincoln concept up for sale

Detroit might be a little on the bankrupt side these days, but there was nothing bankrupt in its ambition during the 1950s; case in point, this 1955 Lincoln Indianapolis design study. Should you want it, it's coming up for auction.

And you might just want it, because this one-off concept car, built for the 1955 Turin Motor Show, is a bright orange lump of Jetsons futurama. Lincoln entrusted Italian coachbuilders Boano - who knocked out a series of special edition Ferrari 250 GTs way back when - to come up with a body to envision the ‘dream cars' of the future.

The aviation influences are clear for all to see, screaming from every pore of this Indianapolis (named so after the legendary race), which sits on a Lincoln chassis complete with a 200bhp V8, four-speed auto ‘box, independent front suspension and a live rear axle. Yes, live. It was the ‘50s, after all.

So what you're looking at is a metal-formed treatise on postwar coachbuilding and the future of the car industry viewed from those heady 1950s. Today, it's being offered up for sale via RM's Art of the Automobile auction, headed for New York City on 21 November.

The expected price? No word as yet, but in 2006, it was sold at a Pebble Beach auction by Gooding & Company for a cool $1,375,000. And considering it's been treated to a full restoration - including that orange paintwork and trim - we'd expect nothing short of a million quid. Watch this space.