Peter Lyon
July 28, 2025
The 11th Hagerty Festival of the Unexceptional took place at Grimsthorpe Castle on Saturday, once again attracting thousands of guests and cars from around the world. A car festival for the mundane. Nothing special or expensive—just ordinary and affordable. Trust the Brits—the home of Monty Python, The Two Ronnies and Fawlty Towers—to come up with such a car event. Brilliant!
Hagerty proved once again that unexceptional cars have an exceptional following. Not only was the concours lawn filled with mundane automotive rarities, but the show parking area was also full of amazing cars that were once commonplace and now seldom seen, for as far as the eye could see.
Amongst the Maxis, Novas and Allegros were Trabants, Ladas and Datsuns, but FOTU brings out the cars others choose not to save. Take the Ford Granada, many of which are still around, but only at this unique event would you find a showroom condition, base model Granada Mk1 2.0 L with a manual gearbox. What about the Talbot Solara? One young owner has three of them, all immaculate and all in the same trim and engine specification.
Hagerty created the first Festival of the Unexceptional in 2014 as a celebration of long-forgotten everyday family cars, particularly those in base trim. Now celebrating cars from the 1970s to the early Millennium, the Festival attracts guests and cars from around the world, many of them younger enthusiasts. For most it is a labour of love, with many owners telling stories of the thousands of hours and pounds they have spent on their beloved vehicles, often way more than the cars are worth.
The very best cars were presented in the Concours de L’Ordinaire on the lawn in front of Grimsthorpe Castle, cars chosen to represent the finest mundane motors. This year, these special cars were judged by experts Steve Cropley, Andrew Frankel, Richard Bremner, Jesse Billington, Sarah Crabtree, Gary Axon, and Jon Bentley.
Third place was awarded to a bright yellow 1979 Citroen Visa Club. One of only three still surviving, this car was immaculate and attracted attention throughout the show. Well done to owner Andy Smith.
A 1999 Ford Mondeo took second place. Owned by Callum Bailey, he spotted the red base model Ford being transported on a truck and about to be made into a banger racer and bought it on the spot. £6000 later and it became a FOTU star and caught the eye of the judges.
Festival of the Unexceptional sees a lot of younger owners and our winner proves that. 22-year-old Simon Packowski united the judges with his showroom standard 1992 Skoda Favorit Forum, a car so basic it doesn’t even have a radio. Simon rescued the car, which was about to be scrapped for a failed head gasket, and brought it back to its former glory, once driving 1000 miles to buy a set of original headrests.
So special was this Skoda, it also won the People’s Choice Award, voted by guests of the show. Well done to Simon for taking home two very special awards.
The judges also gave special mentions to Lucas Split for his Talbot Solara, not least for his 1000-mile road trip to get to the 2025 Festival of the Unexceptional. Glyn Hayler was commended for his Fiat Multipla, Paul Frost for his Bedford Rascal, Matthew Coleman for his Rover 214si and Jason Crawley for his immaculate Citroen Berlingo van.
A host of special guest cars appeared at the event too, including a selection of British Leyland prototypes, kindly supplied by the British Motor Museum. A 1969 Mini 9X hatchback prototype was joined by a model that was definitely ahead of its time, the British Leyland ECV3 from 1981 and there was a 1975 Triumph SD2 prototype. They all provided a glimpse of the FOTU stars we might have seen had they made production.
Away from the cars, motoring podcast duo Smith and Sniff kept crowds entertained on the main stage with live game shows and podcast recordings. Jonny Smith and Richard Porter, true fans of unexceptional cars, brought crowd interaction and fun to FOTU with their automotive ramblings and infectious conversation.
Mark Roper, Managing Director of Hagerty International, added “Festival of the Unexceptional continues to grow bigger with every year. Over the past 11 years we have seen FOTU-era cars become recognised as proper classic cars, and the younger owner demographic shows this is a new movement in car culture. Hagerty is proud to be at the forefront of this and, with events like The Amelia and Motorlux in our portfolio, it perfectly demonstrates how Hagerty works hard to delight all classic vehicle enthusiasts, whatever they drive.”
CARLIST THOUGHTS
It seems like everyone wants to get in on the act. The British Motor Museum team also presented their own award for their choice of car of the show. Stephen Tearle took that trophy for his beautiful, family owned from new, Micra 1.0 Celebration. And a sterling entry it was too!
