The Tommy Hilfiger experience

At the end of October, as world finals came to an end, we were feeling a little down after having killed a piston and missing our chance at the blown fuel record.



As we were collecting or equipment and getting ready for the long drive home, we were suddenly faced with an entirely different option.



A location scout by the name of Todd knopke approached us to let us know that Tommy Hilfiger really like our car and would like to know if we would be interested in staying an extra week to be a part of the photo shoot for their upcoming Spring Summer line. That's Todd on the left.


Hmmmmmm.. That one really threw me for a loop. After some discussion with my pit crew (aka Fiance and friends) it was decided that it sounded like fun and that we were in.



As we discussed the shoot more with the company it turned out that they were still looking for 2 more vehicles of similar appearance, so I let them know that I had one more old race car back at the shop. Bill Burke's original racecar:



and that we could build them another car from an old tank I had hanging from the ceiling.



They liked that idea, so I flew home and my buddy Logan Davis slapped a rolling lakester together in 2 days, and our friend Jerry shot the paint. The color has picked by the art department, not me. haha
And we headed back out to Bonneville with the 2 extra cars.





The 3 day photo shoot went great.




I got to drive the Crow while they shot some video. Here is the You tube:



Here is some of the finished product. Keep an eye out for billboards and magazine ads






While I was there, they asked if I would be interested in bringing the car out to Amsterdam for their runway show. Sounds good to me, I said.
But first we had get all this stuff back home.

On the way home from Bonneville Drew and I stopped by the "old sign graveyard"




and then shot machine guns at the local shooting range.

I think the oversized grin on Drews face pretty much says it all. hahaha

I was excited about the Amsterdam offer, and proposed that Myself, my fiance Carol and my friend Drew be flown over to help with the logistics.
However, shipping a car over to Europe is no easy task as I soon learned over the following few months. By the time we had finished all the details on negotiations with the rental of the car, it was too late to ship out of Los Angeles, so instead the car had to be trucked to New York and put on a container there and shipped to Antwerp, Belgium. Shipping out of New York shaves off about a month of travel time across the ocean.
But once we knew the car was safely in it's container and on the open ocean, the three of us hopped on a Swiss air flight to Amsterdam.

Here is the view from our hotel room



Luckily I had a friend in Belgium.

Hans, seen here in the photo is a vintage motorcycle collector and he helped me get the car from the shipping company in Antwerp.





We transfer it to the Hilfiger showroom in Amsterdam. About a three hour drive.



Once we arrived at the Hilfiger showroom, the front window of the building had to be removed and a crane helped pickup the car from the trailer and hoisted it into the showroom where it will live for the next month. It was quite a production.








We were in Amsterdam for 2 weeks and had a nice time except for the freezing wind and rain that greeted us everyday. (Note to self,..don't go to Europe in the winter)
We drank loads of Belgium beer and met some great people. As illustrated in the following pictures.






All in all it was an wonderfully interesting experience and all thanks to the crazy world of Hot rodding, land speed racing and the fashion industry.

To view more pics of our adventure, follow this link:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v337/bellytank/hilfiger%20story/