Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato Sanction II Coupé up for grabs at Bonhams sale

Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato Sanction II

The Aston Martin sale at Newport Pagnell in May has one of the four Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato Sanction II Coupés ever built up for sale.

The Ferrari 250 GTO may have shown the Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato a clean pair of heels on track and gone on to be perhaps the most expensive car on the planet. But the truth is the Aston Martin is far more beautiful.

That beauty and appeal is reflected in its worth – probably £5 million for one of the 19 cars built – but there is a cheaper way to get what is, to all intents and purposes, a ‘real’ DB4GT Zagato.

When Aston Martin built the DB4 GT Zagato they planned to make 25 cars but only 19 were actually built, perhaps because each cost £5,470 in 1961 – twice the price of the average house.

So in 1991 Aston Martin sanctioned the building of four Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato Sanction II cars, each with a DB4 chassis upgraded to DB4 GT specification and bodied by Zagato. There were a few modifications from the original spec – bigger engine, different carbs, better brakes and Goodyear tyres – but the Sanction II cars were, in effect, a continuation of Aston Martin’s original production run.

When the Sanction II cars were built in 1991 they sold for £750,000, about half the price of an original DB4 GT Zagato. An original Zagato would probably now cost you the best part of £5 million, yet this Sanction II car is estimated at just £1.2-1.5 million.

In the flesh the DB4 GT Zagato is stunning and remarkably contemporary in design (but it’s quite small – about the size of a Golf) and if you’ve got the funds this is a great way to grab one of Aston Martin’s greatest ever cars.

(Note: In case you’re wondering, the final two chassis numbers were used to build the Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato Sanction III in 2000, although they don’t carry the same factory kudos as the Sanction II cars – and sell for far less).