On December 1 in London, Bonhams will offer Ringo Starr's 1964 Facel-Vega Facel II, an incredibly rare French grand tourer.
 Upon buying the car, Ringo joined a list of celebrity Facel owners, including Picasso, Stirling Moss and Frank Sinatra |
The car, bought by Starr from the stand at Earls Court Motor Show in 1964, will sell with a £300,000-350,000 ($486,090-567,105) estimate. It was originally bought for £5,570, which was an astonishing sum for a car at the time.
Facel-Vega was a short-lived French company that became known for producing stylish, luxuriant and fast cars.
Hand-built, Ringo's Facel-Vega II is one of just two examples produced with the larger 6.7 Litre engine and manual gearbox, and is the very last of only 26 right-hand drive Facel II's produced. It boasts a 390bhp V8 Chrysler Typhoon engine with bodywork by Jean Daninos.
"This car has to be one of the rarest and most collectable modern classic cars given its almost unique engineering and its place as part of pop music history," commented Bonhams' Sholto Gilbertson.
"The sale of this car represents a once in a lifetime opportunity for anyone who loves cars and the Beatles."
This is far from the first Beatle car to have sold at auction, with John Lennon's Ferrari 330GT selling for $544,000 at Goodwood in July and Paul McCartney's Aston Martin DB5 bringing $496,500 in October 2012.
John Lennon's psychedelic Rolls-Royce Phantom V sold for $2.2m in 1985, earning the record for any piece of music memorabilia.
See our huge selection of Beatles memorabilia for sale, including an autographed photo of Ringo Starr.
