The Other Bridge: Cars & Coffee Is Free, Fun & Ferrari Filled Too

The Bridge is easily one of the nicest events of the year in the Hamptons. Classic car exhibitor Elliot Cuker calls it a “jolt of joy that places beauty over politics.” So he had a ticket. He also brought a classic Porsche. But for the rest of us there was Cars & Coffee on Sunday behind the Bridgehampton Museum. Hey, it has “Bridge” in the name, kinda.

Here, the high-end mixes with daily drives. I’m talking about the cars and the crowd.

“This is great, it’s for masses and it’s a fantastic vibe,” says Matthew Ammirati. He owns The Bridgehampton Motor Club where swells store their prized Porsches, Mustangs and Ferraris. “They put this Cars & Coffee event back on the map with this ‘Bridge’ show,” he adds.

There’s a “plethora of Panteras” on the front lawn. Then out back a fetching Rosso red ’64 Alfa convertible with a bone interior. It’s across from a VW camper. Sotheby’s realtor Angela Boyer-Stump and her husband Norm and son Hunter brought that along with a brown Porsche 911 convertible that was mostly “original.” Meaning a seat rip here and a worn carpet there wouldn’t do at The Bridge up the hill the previous day. Even though some of their pricey “barn finds” are largely untouched.

Here, the regular cars mix with the pricey ones. Interior designer Tom Samet brought a wood paneled ’80s Mercury Colony Park station wagon. It could drive straight from his house in East Hampton to Wally World with the Griswolds. Lots of Mustangs dot the lawn with everyone taking in the sheet metal views.

Ammirati notes there are “more muscle cars here” than at The Bridge.

Respectfully, no one is kicking tires. That’s because very few of the cars here are for sale. Some new car brands like Karma and Czinger were at The Bridge. Down here, the lone auto brand isn’t a brand at all. It’s an electric car conversion company that puts Tesla technology in older Porsches, Land Rovers and Mercedes G Wagons. Everrati is from Los Angeles. William Morse is telling me his $350,000 911 goes 200 miles on a charge. He likes what he might call “Electric Cars & Coffee” — “We just came from Pebble Beach and there’s nothing like this.”

There’s a jazz combo under a tree. I don’t have the guts to ask if they know “Little Deuce Coupe” but there’s probably a real one in the crowd of classics here somewhere. For now, I’m wandering around, coffee in hand, admiring everyone else’s cars. The folks putting all this together don’t give out actual attendance numbers. Suffice it to say, there are a lot of people here. At least 300 or 400. Even more yesterday at The Bridge. Both events seem to be growing.

Full disclosure, I rode a bike here. Maybe Tom Samet can toss it in the back of his Colony Park and give me a ride home. We’d probably have to stop at a gas station along the way. If he’ll put the tailgate down, I’ll hang my legs down and ride “caboose” like our parents let us do before Ralph Nader came along.

“Cars & Coffee” brings back a lot of those kinds of memories. Now if I could just find the Alfa owner, maybe he would part with it for the right price. But it’s so nice, he’d probably just laugh. And drive off.

Bill McCuddy likes cars, cigars, watches and coffee from Java in Bridgehampton where you’ll usually find him doing The New York Times crossword puzzle. He is an infrequent Dans contributor.