I’m going to step back from the world of ultimate performance 911s to bask in the beauty of a vintage Porsche. While there certainly existed performance variants of the 356 back in its day, by modern standards performance is very much beside the point when having a look at one of these cars. They’re very lightweight – I was struck by just how small a 911T appeared relative to the cars around it when I encountered one on the street this past weekend – and there is very little separating driver from machine to dull communication between them, but fewer than 100 horses is just that and modern suspension engineering is another world entirely. Yet, when I see a 356, which I think has only happened twice that I can remember, I’m just as struck by how different they look and how elegant they can be. Many vintage automobiles possess a similar stature and it is the nostalgia for these designs that drives many to seek them out. The example here isn’t entirely original – it’s engine is a period correct unit from the 912 – but it comes in an extremely subtle, but still very pretty, Dolphin Grey and comes from very near the end of 356 production. Here we have a 1964 Porsche 356C SC Karmann Coupe, located in California, with what sounds like around 120K miles on it (the seller assumes the odometer has turned over, but doesn’t have verification).
