Racing driver Sydney Allard's post-war cars combined the same virtues of lightweight, independent front suspension and an abundance of American V8 power, which had been features of his first trials special of the mid-1930s.

These favourable characteristics enabled Allard cars to establish a formidable competition record in the immediate post-war years; Allard himself finishing 3rd at Le Mans in a J2 two-seater and winning the Monte Carlo Rally outright in a P2 saloon.

Introduced in 1952, the pretty, alloy-bodied Palm Beach was Sydney Allard's final sports car design, employing a K3-type tubular chassis and his trademark independently suspended swing axles at the front with a coil-sprung live axle at the rear.

Of all -aluminium construction and a choice of engines it proved to be very desirable, indeed, of the 76 MkIs built, 58 were ordered by global customers as far afield as the USA, New Zealand, Sweden, Madagascar and Mexico.

Of the 16 ‘home market’ cars, it is thought only a few...