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"  In late April, 43 of the world&amp;#039;s most beautiful classic cars descended upon Venice&amp;#039;s Piazza San Giorgio, their headlights gazing out over the Riva water taxis in St. Mark&amp;#039;s Canal. The cars and their black tie-bedecked drivers had just completed the Louis Vuitton Classic Serenissima Run, a six-day rally that began in Monte Carlo. And the piazza, with the gleaming white marble of the 16th-century Church of San Giorgio Maggiore serving as backdrop, had to be one of the most elegant finish lines for any event revolving around an internal combustion engine. That is, at least since the last Louis Vuitton Classic rally. The Serenissima was the seventh the French fashion house has staged over the past two decades, which makes perfect sense when you consider that Vuitton designed and manufactured the first automobile &amp;quot;trunk&amp;quot; in 1897. Really, the events are far less rally race and more moving Concours d&amp;#039;Elegance. Vuitton extends invitations to each handpicked participant, and the caliber of cars selected rivals the finest car shows and automotive museums in the world, with a cumulative value exceeding $250 million. Among the preeminent autophiles who partook were Beverly Hills-based Bruce Meyer; Hong Konger Michael Kadoorie, the billionaire chairman of the Peninsula Hotel Group; and Dutchman Evert Louwman, owner of the Michael Graves-designed automotive museum in the Hague. On the auto side of things, standouts of the standouts included the 99-year-old Isotta Fraschini IM, a two-seat racer with spoked wheels and a pair of leather belts keeping the front hood atop the four-cylinder engine. (It received the jury&amp;#039;s Special Prize.) This being Italia, there was also, of course, Ferrarissima, including a pair of 250 GTOs \u2014 sports-car nonpareils worth around $25 million each \u2014 and a threesome with some serious provenance: Gianni Agnelli&amp;#039;s 1955 375 America, Roberto Rossellini&amp;#039;s 1955 375 Mille Miglia coupe, and King Leopold III&amp;#039;s 1967 330 GTC. Not to be outdone, a couple of Bugattis also ran, with Italian Giuseppe Redaelli&amp;#039;s Type 23 earning first prize. Although the Serenissima Run&amp;#039;s name is derived from the &amp;quot;serenity&amp;quot; of the Republic of Venice (the city&amp;#039;s nickname is La Serenissima), the driving proved a bit treacherous. The 870-mile route that began at the Casino de Monte-Carlo was chosen by Ren\u00E9 Metge, the French racer with three Paris to Dakar Rally victories to his name. Drivers negotiated snow-lined mountain passes in the Alps; switchbacks slick with rain along lakes Maggiore, Como, and Garda; and backcountry lanes not much wider than a Vespa before reaching Venice on a Friday evening. (There were, however, champagne-and-gelato-filled pit stops in Menthon-Saint-Bernard, Verona, and Fiesso d&amp;#039;Artico, home to Vuitton&amp;#039;s shoemaking headquarters, where each motorist received a pair of blue suede driving shoes.) Come Saturday night in Venice, the prizes had all been handed out, but the drivers were still racing \u2014 toward the magnums of Mo\u00EBt &amp;amp;amp; Chandon at a gala dinner at the Giorgio Cini Foundation. Nonracing revelers included Luchino Visconti di Modrone, the Vuitton ambassador and a nephew of the great Italian film director for whom he is named; Philippe and Jasmine Starck; and Antonine Peduzzi and Luisa Orsini, the designers of the bag line TL-180. The band played late into the night, and Vuitton CEO Yves Carcelle was one of the last shimmying on the dance floor. As the song goes: The road goes on forever and the party never ends. Andiamo, tutti! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.townandcountrymag.com/the-scene/parties/a910/serenissma-run-2012/>