27 Forever

’27 Club’ member Janis Joplin’s custom 1965 Porsche 356C 1600 cabriolet heads to auction with a guide of £260,000 and thus proves it wasn’t just “my friends [whom] all drive Porsches”

Janis Joplin is one of the best-known members of a club that most would rather not join: the 27 Club. This American singer-songwriter joined Jimi Hendrix, who died just two weeks earlier, as a member when she died of a heroin overdose on 4^th October 1970 aged, like him, just 27 years old. Now, as was reported earlier this week by Sam Dangremond in Town & Country, her psychedelic Porsche is headed to auction with a guide of £260,700 ($400,000).

27 Forever – Janis Joplin’s custom 1965 Porsche 365C 1600 cabriolet heads to auction at RM Sotheby’s Driven by Disruption sale in New York on 10th December 2015 — Janis Joplin with her dog George in the Porsche

Described by her brother Michael Joplin as “a part of rock’n’roll history”, the car – which was originally Oyster White in colour and which has been “restored more than once over the years – was bought second-hand for $3,500 (the equivalent of $24,000 or £15,450 today) by the singer in 1968 and owned by her until her untimely death. Of her and it, he added:

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Two stories to keep beside you

Results of Driven by Disruption – RM Sotheby’s – 10th December 2015 – New York, America – Janis Joplin Porsche rockets and sells for $1.6 million

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Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Porsche?

The results of RM Sotheby’s 10th December ‘Driven by Disruption’ auction were mixed but the Janis Joplin Porsche rocketed through the roof and sold for a staggering sum

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A Purist Porsche

First 2016 Porsche 911 R to come to auction; it’s offered with a surprisingly reasonable estimate given the recent frenzy over Porsches In the wake of the success of 1990s Porsches at RM Sotheby’s Battersea sale earlier this month – where a 1995 Porsche 911 GT2 sold for £1 million (€1.2 million or $1.3 […]

“Like most people and their car of choice, her Porsche is a direct link to Janis. She drove it everywhere – and with everyone that was anyone in the San Francisco music scene – with the top down and her feathers flying”.

Customised in a psychedelic style by Michael Joplin and Dave Roberts, one of Janis’s roadies, the car was given the name “The History of the Universe”. It features imagery of the artist along with butterflies and jellyfish and suffered the indignity of being sprayed grey after being stolen in 1969 as its thief realised it would be too recognisable.

Recovered and restored, the Porsche was used as a courtesy car by Joplin’s manager Albert Grossman after her death. It was later returned to the Joplin family and after being restored again has been on loan to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame since 1995.