It seems like it was just yesterday that we unloaded the orange fleet of Porsches at Luft’s previous European stop in Wrocław, Poland. Yet here we are, more than two months later, once again placing the four cars belonging to the Rennmeister project, managed by our in-house creative agency CD Works, at the Vilhelm Lauritzen Terminal at Copenhagen airport.
The venue itself is pretty special. A modernist masterpiece, designed and built in the 1930’s, a time when there was no typology for what an airport should look like. Perfectly preserved, with spectacular winding staircases and an undulating ceiling that despite being a robust structure of reinforced concrete looks almost like a piece of delicate fabric that’s about to be blown away by the wind. Used until this day to receive VIPs, it was inspired by the works of Picasso and Braque, and through its design it transports all that enter back in time to a world of grey suits, black neckties, whisky and cigarettes consumed from the early morning on.
Speaking of VIPs, this time around we were joined by legendary Porsche collector, former fashion mogul and famous outlaw builder Magnus Walker, who was Jägermeister’s guest at the event. Magnus distributed and signed a limited edition (only 250 units) collaboration poster between him and the Rennmeister project, which caused all sorts of mayhem and resulted in a line that had people queuing for 3 hours to have a chance to interact with him.
To Magnus’s credit - and our amazement - he took the time to meet every single person in the queue, to talk to them and ask questions about who they were, what they did, what they drove, etc. Each encounter lasted at least a couple of minutes and ended with a loud “Skål” and “Stay Weird!” exclamation.
When we ran out of posters, people brought their own, bought at the official Lugtgekühlt store as well as sneakers, steering wheels, t-shirts, small children etc. Two Sharpies were depleted in this battle against the enthusiastic crowds. Finally, the proceedings came to an end and someone fired up David Piper’s iconic green 917, which produced one of the best sounds known to mankind and transported us straight to Le Mans, while letting us know it was time to clear the stage and let the others shine.
As for the other cars - the beautiful, wooden airplane hangar nearby was filled with early examples of the 356, which all looked like boiled sweets, perhaps excluding the example raced by Bruce Jennings, with its two-tone silver and burgundy paint job, racing decals and a roll cage. The parking lots were filled to the brim with all kinds of other air-cooled machines. 914s, 911s, a 959 and 956 and other special metal. There was also a whole display celebrating the 50th birthday of the 911 Turbo. Our favourite car of the event? Apart from the Rennmeister fleet of course, it had to be the pastel yellow ex-Emerson Fittipaldi RSR, which used to belong to Pablo Escobar. Was it just us, or could you still spot traces of white powder on the dashboard?
No gathering of this type is complete without running into the usual movers and shakers of the car scene. At the fantastic Luft pre-party, held at the picturesque Copenhagen meatpacking district, we ran into organisers Jeff Zwart and Patrick Long, photographer Vince Perraud, Mr. Petro Surf - Ken Hake, influencer Hanna Schönwald, graphic designer Sophie Küppers and other friends from various Porsche crews, like the infamous Hamburg Heck Crew. The atmosphere that evening was fantastically laid back, with beautiful people, cars and great food in abundance.
If we were to summarise the whole experience, we would have to go back to the subject of Magnus Walker. Despite the real sensory overload that usually accompanies these sorts of events, during which you feel truly overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of cars and creativity, we observed that around a decade ago he influenced the scene as no one else had done before. All those drilled, motorsport-inspired door handles, balsa/skateboard gear knobs, yellow headlights and aftermarket wheels (some of them designed by Magnus himself) on the cars displayed at Luft were undeniably influenced by the 'outlaw style' he pioneered.
There’s nothing wrong with staying in your lane, but if we learned anything at Luftgekühlt, it’s that ‘keeping it weird’ is what moves the game forward.
Photos by Igor Sinitsin
