Show & Glow 2014

Words & Photos by Henry Phull

 

Show & Glow have returned for their second year, to the incredible “Glow” exhibition venue at Bluewater in Kent. It’s that time of the year, the weather has started to play up and not make its mind up, so hosting one of the last shows of the season indoors is certainly the most sensible thing to do. What makes Show & Glow unique is that it is situated inside a shopping centre – not just any shopping centre, but one of the biggest in the UK. This makes for a fun day out for pretty much anyone you bring along. If they get bored of looking at cars… all of the shops are next door, not to mention some fantastic food establishments. These things combined with some of the UK and Europe’s finest show cars, makes a fantastic day out.

 

I’ll kick things off on the first floor of the show, with Simon Delahaye’s (the main man behind Show & Glow) stunning Mk2 Golf. This thing is just pure Mk2 perfection, the attention to detail throughout is staggeringly impressive, with numerous subtle touches such as Porsche door handles and a super rare Petri steering wheel. Plus, you’ve got to love those custom Pirelli P-Slot splits, they work so well on the car! It’s been a long old build for Simon but he’s executed it perfectly.

 

 

 

 

After admiring Aneysha’s (of FittedUK) recently purchased ’64 Beetle on Instagram it was awesome to finally see it for real, a mint example and stunning colour combo.

 

 

 

There’s one Scirocco that beats them all hands down, and that is Frederik Ceulemans’ bagged Mk1 on BBS RS, a timeless wheel choice for any Mk1. Whether it’s the rebuilt 16V turbo sitting in the impeccable engine bay, the stunning paintwork or fabulous retrimmed custom Porsche interior, Frederik’s Scirocco has it all.

 

 

 

I couldn’t resist a cheeky rear shot of Matt Clifford’s E31, seeing as most people, including myself, tend to shoot it front-on.

 

 

Who doesn’t love centre locks!?

 

 

On the Kleen Freaks stand I was first drawn in by Rob and Harry’s impressive Lupo GTI sitting on CCW D11L 3-piece wheels and resprayed in Candy red.

 

 

 

Followed by Kats Mk5 and Steve’s Mk6 on those awesome Rotiform DIAs.

 

 

It was nice to also see a few of the Westside Mk1’s that we saw last weekend at Westside Treffen 2014.

 

 

 

 

 

There have been some amazing examples of stepped-up rims this year, and these are two of the best sets out there, the classic RS and RF models. It’s just nice to see people taking modifications to the next level and improving on two very popular wheels seen on the majority of show cars.

 

 

I’ve always been a big fan of the Lemass Automotive 964, that paint and those gold centre BBS E28s go together ever so well.

 

 

James Aveil’s W114 oozes retro beauty, I can’t wait to shoot this outdoors in sunshine sometime so you can fully appreciate how good it looks inside and out, most people don’t realise that this is actually a brown car!

 

 

Thankfully the weather held out, and we had some rays, perfect for checking out the outside area of the show, situated on one of the adjacent upper level car parks.

 

 

 

The high standard of Mk2 Golfs continued with these two beautiful examples, the 4-door above on a set of Fittipaldi Type 19s…

 

 

…and this 2-door TDI rocking a set of incredible BBS E30, wheel porn!

 

 

 

 

Back inside and I made my way downstairs to another room, with even more cars on display, all looking moody under the lighting. Although it looked cool, it was certainly a challenge for us photographers.

 

I loved the Mercedes Alphard wheels on this bagged Mk5 GTI.

 

 

And another bagged Mk5 this time on a set of 19″ Rotiform LHRs.

 

 

This was the first time I had seen Matt’s B7 after he’d painted the centres orange, really helps set the wheels off from the car, which is always difficult with silver.

 

 

I was excited to finally see this car again and have a proper look around, Josh William’s RS6. Now the RS6 Avant is a huge car, seeing it on air and pretty much on the floor is an incredible sight. The interior has been recently re-trimmed in yellow, and it really compliments the paintwork.

 

 

Especially when it’s tucking 20s…

 

 

 

Kiran Mistry’s Audi 80 Sport is always a real head turner and one car I never get tired of, this time with blackout headlights.

 

 

 

 

One of the most talked about cars this year has been RollHard‘s Volvo 240, nicknamed “Bricky”, bagged and on BBS RF splits. It’s not surprising, it just works so well with a drop and wheels – that’s all classic cars need sometimes.

 

 

The RollHard stand also had two visitors from Belgium, both part of the “Belgian Chapter” show that RH put on. Firstly this awesome Imola yellow B5 S4 Avant…

 

 

Followed by this TT rocking another bold colour, Signal green. Notice the widened arches too, this is definitely a hardcore vehicle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

More centre locks, this time on a Cupra R. These are TSW Pin Drive 19″ examples, also note the huge Porsche brake upgrade, one mean machine.

 

 

 

 

 

I loved this set of Ferrari 599 wheels on Anthony’s bagged Bora, something a little different from the norm.

 

 

 

 

 

Heading outside again, I ran into Luke’s Mk3 that we saw last weekend at Westside – nice to see it on the tarmac and pulling off those 3SDMs.

 

 

Moving on to Nikki Harris’ supercharged Mini Cooper S… I shot this at last year’s show when she was rocking red wheels. This year the Brock B1s have been sprayed blue which somehow look even better, one badass little Mini.

 

 

Polo’s don’t often grab my attention, but this one stood out to me, especially being in wagon form and sitting this low static.

 

 

Another set of Keskin KT1s, this time on a Mk1 Caddy! This was sitting nicely with the assistance of air ride.

 

 

Take a peek at the air set up, enclosed nicely in a picnic style basket which suited the wooden covered bed, super cool!

 

 

After seeing Joey Gordon hide this away behind the FrameSlayers stand last week at Westside, I’m pleased to say he was back to cause a stir with his Datsun B11 now sitting at a proper ride height on some Enkei’s.

 

 

We want to see more retro cars like this next year… This just proves that you can go out and find one of the ugliest cars and do something cool with it. If you choose wisely, people are going to love it, like they seem to be doing now with Joeys!

 

 

E36’s are so common these days but Tallis Godfrey’s M3 Evo cabriolet is a perfect example that I never tire of seeing. He’s worked hard to get it sitting as it is, and clearly the fitment is finally spot on.

 

 

The Gottis suited this white Mk1 cab rather perfectly.

 

 

 

I’ve always been impressed by Aaron Gemmell’s EK4 Civic, on hydraulic suspension and awesome CCW LM16 wheels.

 

 

It’s good to see more and more girls getting into the car scene and putting their touches on their pride and joy, like this Mk2 Seat Leon on a set of bright pink centred OZ splits.

 

 

 

I’ll finish off with Jack Ellis’ B3 Passat wagon. Points if you noticed the front NOS heckblende!

 

 

So that just about wraps up this years Show & Glow. Being a smaller show, what I like about it is I finally had a chance to look over cars properly and admire the smaller details – I’m usually far too busy running around trying to photograph everything. Being near to the end of the year, surprisingly I was still noticing cars I hadn’t even properly seen before, so this was the perfect venue for me to do just that. A big thanks to Simon and the team for having us down once again. For their second ever show, they are doing well with plenty of people showing support. The future only looks bright for their refreshing event, keep up the good work guys and hopefully see you next year.