Purists Look Away: There’s An RWB Porsche 911 For Sale

There are two main kinds of classic Porsche 911 fan: those who treasure originality, matching numbers, and the preservation of the precise engineering that was refined over 34 years of air-cooled cars; and those who see the car as a platform for individuality, expression and modification.

The former camp might want to avert its eyes, because sure nothing represents the attitude of the latter better than an RWB 911. Since the late 1990s, the company, founded by Japanese tuner Akira Nakai, has been churning out these wild widebodied versions of various generations of 911, from G-Series cars of the 1970s to the water-cooled 997 of the 2000s.

Now, the opportunity has arisen to own an RWB-ified example of the final generation of air-cooled 911. It started life in 1995 as a US-market 993 Carrera, a car powered by a 272bhp 3.6-litre flat-six. Originally finished in the deep metallic shade of Iris Blue, it lived a pretty unremarkable life for its first 21 years, moving around various parts of the USA.

It was in 2016 when a car collector in the UAE acquired it that things got interesting. The car was shipped over to Dubai, where it was given the RWB treatment by Akira Nakai himself. This involved stripping it back to the bare shell, where it was resprayed in the classic Porsche shade of Mexico Blue.

It was then fitted with RWB’s 993-specific widebody kit, which includes the massively flared arches and a huge rear wing reminiscent of the one from the 993 GT2R racer. The factory grey and blue leather upholstery was thrown out in favour of an all-black mix of leather and Alcantara, along with a pair of modern Recaro bucket seats. It seems to have been mechanically left alone with the exception of that delicious short-shift kit and the obvious track width extension. Currently, it sits on 84,397 miles.

The car was christened ‘Hideyoshi’ after Toyotomi Hideyoshi, a 16th-century Japanese Samurai who was born into a peasant family and worked his way up to become the effective leader of Japan. This led to the other big visual change, a stencilled depiction of Hideyoshi on the car’s sides by Japanese street artist Ryo Ogawa, better known as RoamCouch. It’s thought to be the only vehicle he’s worked on.

Now, Hideyoshi is looking for a new owner. It’s being sold at RM Sotheby’s Dubai auction on 9 March, where it’s expected to fetch between £120k and £160k. An unmodified 993 Carrera of a similar spec and mileage is currently worth around £60k, so it’s a big jump, but the opportunity to own one of Akira Nakai’s wild creations rarely comes up, especially when finished with a unique piece of art.

It might get a bit of a frosty reception at your next Porsche owners’ club meetup, but pretty much everywhere else, you’ll be standing out for all the right reasons.