This 26-year-old designer has bought two oldtimer Mercedes cars – partly because they are more sustainable than new cars
Many people think of classic cars as an old man’s hobby. 26-year-old hanna schonwald proves the opposite with her two classic mercedes cars – a W123 coupe for the summer and a W124 T-model for the winter.
In an interview, she tells us how she acquired both classic cars at a comparatively low price and how much effort and expense she put into them.
Schonwald, herself a product designer, appreciates more than just the nostalgic aesthetics of classic cars. in your opinion, it is also more sustainable to drive existing vehicles for as long as possible than to buy a new car that is supposedly lower in emissions.
When you’re out and about at classic car fairs and meetings, you notice a certain homogeneity. At first glance, the audience is middle-aged or advanced – and male. But that doesn’t mean that only older people live out their passion for classic cars. On instagram, there are a few young people who post content about cars that are much older than they are.
She bought her first mercedes for 3000 euros
One of them is hanna schonwald, who now has more than 17.000 people follow. the 26-year-old product designer not only shows her art on her website, but also her two four-wheeled companions. In everyday life, she swears by mercedes e-classes from the eighties. In the warm summer months, she mainly drives her 1984 230 CE of the W123 generation. The coupe in "champagne metallic" has grown so fond of her that she has affectionately christened it "jurgen.
Her first car was a tuned ford focus, which she says was a great car, but was helpless against curbs. a few years later, schonwald realized she wanted a more classic and stylish ride. "2018 was the first time i looked at what was affordable. I came across a W 123 sedan, which I then bought for 3,000 euros," says the young classic car driver in an interview with business insider.
But the condition of her first classic car was also about what you would expect given the low price. "Even garden hoses were used," recalls the Bielefeld native. "i freshened up the limo a bit and then sold it. I used the money to buy the coupe about two and a half years ago for 6,000 euros," she tells us.
Some wrenching talent is more than helpful
the know-how and craftsmanship she acquired during the restoration of the limousine were also helpful in the work on the golden coupe. Jurgen, which she found through the W123 club in baden-wurttemberg, was already much better than its predecessor, both technically and visually, when she bought it. Apart from a few small things and rust work, there was no need for action on the car. But that’s not the only reason why the costs stayed within reasonable limits: "since i already knew a little bit about it, it was mainly material costs. The coupe was okay. And now it’s really good," recalls schonwald.
The 200 diesel lacks temperament
The W123 series is considered by experts to be legendarily robust and reliable. According to schonwald, this also applies to her exemplar, which now has a proud 360.000 kilometers on the clock: "it’s a top car. I have absolutely no problems with it." recently she got herself another star – which is again older than she is. She bought the w124 t-model from an older couple in her circle of acquaintances. While the coupe hibernates, the blue station wagon from 1987 also has to work in snow and rain. "my jurgen is a little too pretty for winter now, when salt is sprinkled," she says with a laugh.
She’s happy to do without modern infotainment systems and digital cockpits, but there’s one thing the designer says would be quite pleasant in her two eighties classics: "when I’ve been in a modern car again for a change, I miss its speed a little bit afterwards. It’s cool, but when I sit down in an old porsche, for example, I have that too," she notes.
Her W124 station wagon in particular, with its 72 hp, is anything but a spawn of temperament: "it’s a 200 diesel. So it tends to go backwards," jokes schonwald. "I personally don’t miss anything, but of course I’m aware that there have been technical improvements and that old cars aren’t really any better," the old-timer driver clarifies.
Even though she is more than happy with her two stars, she would like to fulfill her dream of owning a fast sports car from zuffenhausen in the long term: "I would like to buy a porsche 964 turbo. That’s the next thing I’d really like to do. Even if a little money is still missing at the moment."
in the beginning there was a mercedes stamp
Most of the young people in the classic car scene were introduced to the subject by their parents or grandparents, but schonwald did not have any family background. Her interest in old cars was triggered by stamps she collected in her childhood. One day, her stepfather gave her a special copy of a classic mercedes as a gift. "that’s when i first noticed that there are cars that are beautiful, that i simply like better," she recalls.
her passion was further ignited during her internship at a car repair shop: "we also had classic mustangs there from time to time. This was my first direct contact with older vehicles," says the designer. There she learned to appreciate the simple technology of the oldtimers. During her studies at the university of pforzheim, a dedicated professor of automotive design history made sure that she got herself a classic car: "he did his job very well and got me extremely interested in classic cars," the 26-year-old recalls.
"it’s just not the same product anymore."
Schonwald appreciates not only the design of the classic cars, which she believes were not only more beautiful in the past, but also much more functional and honest. "at the end of the ’90s, the car was kind of overthought, at least when it came to the internal combustion engine. the classic concept of a car was enough for me until then."
Today’s cars, on the other hand, are often pure lifestyle products. "what’s coming now is no longer a car in the classic sense of the word. It still has the same function, of course, namely to get people from A to B, but it’s simply no longer the same product," says the Hamburg resident.
with old cars you can do more by yourself
But financial aspects also led to her decision to drive cars that are more than thirty years old in everyday life: "well, if you’re honest, it started with the fact that when you’re 18 you simply don’t have the money to buy a new car. Well, at least I didn’t have that."if you have a certain amount of skill, you can also save yourself the odd repair shop bill: "with an old car, you can do a lot more yourself, because it was designed that way from the ground up. It runs smoothly and has a longer service life," says the hobby mechanic.
"a big issue when it comes to sustainability"
While politicians and the media talk almost exclusively about electric cars, the production of which can emit several tons of CO2, schonwald believes that the second-hand mentality is also the right attitude when it comes to buying cars: "i believe that old cars are now a very big issue when it comes to sustainability. So for me at least they are! I need something that’s already there, that I can basically recycle."
"the only thing you have to worry about now is the fuel. It’s also a very exciting topic, and there’s a lot happening," she continues. The classic cars have long since recovered the energy once used in their production, but the fossil fuels and the exhaust gases produced by their combustion are anything but clean. Here, e-fuels based on hydrogen could further reduce the carbon footprint, she says.
Nostalgia factor like analog cameras
Even if fewer and fewer young people are taking out their driver’s licenses, schonwald believes in the future of historic vehicles. This theory is supported by the fact that classic automobiles are culturally almost ubiquitous. models from the seventies and eighties in particular are popular requisites in music videos, fashion shows or films, says schonwald.
"i also think that young people can get excited about nostalgic things because they represent a time when all this hustle and bustle with social media and all that didn’t exist yet. People like my little sister, who is twelve, don’t know what the world is like without a cell phone," says Schonwald.
She compares old cars with another outdated technology that is currently enjoying a resurgence in popularity: "analog cameras would theoretically no longer be needed today, but they still have something interesting about them because they show the state of the art at the time."
In the meantime, Schonwald no longer just drives the old cars, but also captures them with a paintbrush on works of art. She sometimes prints the latter on T-shirts and sells them. in 2021 she hand painted a customer’s car, a classic porsche 964, and created her first artcar based on andy warhol’s famous BMW M1.
Porsche was so enthusiastic about the basic concept that the carmaker finally decided to support the project, which took almost a whole year to realize.