PPG announced that acclaimed custom car builder and painter Darryl Hollenbeck won the 2016 America’s Most Beautiful Roadster (AMBR) award at the Grand National Roadster Show (GNRS) held at the Pomona Fairplex in Pomona, Calif., Jan. 29-31. It was the third time Hollenbeck has painted an AMBR winner, and the first time he captured the prize with his own car – a PPG-painted 1932 Ford highboy roadster.
The GNRS started in 1950 and is the longest running indoor car show in the world, and the AMBR, a towering eight-foot-tall trophy, is considered the ultimate recognition for a roadster-style hot rod. This year, a field of 13 outstanding cars – built by the elites of the custom car world – competed for the prestigious award. In the end, the judges named Darryl and Terri Hollenbeck’s classically-styled roadster the winner, giving Hollenbeck another honor to add to his long list of accomplishments including AMBR wins in 2005 and 2013.
Hollenbeck and his colleagues Dan Webb and Cory Taulbert built the car at Vintage Color Studio, the custom shop Hollenbeck owns and operates in Concord, Calif., and where he has been using PPG products exclusively for more than 25 years. Hollenbeck then painted the car himself. He came up with the roadster’s unique color, dubbed “Rotten Avocado Green,” applying a custom mix created with the PPG ENVIROBASE High Performance waterborne paint system along with Single-Stage DCC9300 from the DELTRON refinish system.
“Winning an AMBR is a dream; to win it with my own car, wow, I’m over the moon about that,” said Hollenbeck. “As for the color, it is different. My wife wanted brown, I wanted green. Depending on the light, you see one color or the other – or both. The great thing was that the PPG paint was easy to work with. It gave us the chance to experiment, to really stretch our imaginations and come up with something cool.”
Hollenbeck is prominent among Northern California’s custom car set. His well-respected eye for color has led to his paint jobs being highlighted on vehicles that have graced the covers and photo spreads of notable publications including Street Rodder and Rodder’s Journal. Several Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance show winners have also displayed Hollenbeck’s painting skills.
