In late June I went to Miataland in Italy. It was fantastic. For the sake of time, I'm just going to copy my FB review.
Miataland is in a rural area outside a tiny little town of maybe 100 people down a long dirt road. Once through the gate Andrea greeted us and began to show us the property. First stop was the Miata collection. Afterall, this is primarily the reason why we were here!
If you love Miatas then you must go visit Andrea and Miataland near Perugia in central Italy. I was just there and it was incredible. Andrea is one of us, a real petrolhead and Miata nut who is not only a connoisseur, but a true ambassador who echoes the fun loving spirit of these little roadsters.
We stayed overnight in his guest room, which was clean and comfortable and had a full private bath and private entrance. It was decorated nicely. There was even a copy of Roadster Bros. magazine near the fireplace if you need some reading material and a cool collection of aftermarket Miata steering wheels. Soon his larger guest house that adjoins the main house will be open to serve even more guests. He kindly gave us a tour of the construction and his vision for the property once completed. It will be very luxurious and quintessentially Italian, with famous Deruta porcelain tiles and oak wood trim and flooring throughout from a local master craftsman. Not to mention the large library of Miata and other automotive books and magazines.
Unfortunately we didn't have time for a swim in the beautiful pool. There were too many other things to see, like the large Miata collection of over 40 cars that is absolutely without peer. The best part for me was seeing and sitting inside his rare M2-1001, which I consider to be the crown jewel of his collection. He also has two M2-1002, a M2-1028, various tuner style cars like a widebody Mazdaspeed N2 Nopro car, Pit Crew Racing car, Bugeye car, supercharged V8 Mega Monster, a RS-Limited, NC race car, every color NA ever made, many fine NB including 10th Anniversary edition, and a very special 1 of 1 Miataland edition ND Miata RF, which he kindly let us take for a drive in the countryside. We visited nearby Monte Castillo de Viturbo and enjoyed many twists and turns. It was a perfect car for such fun driving roads.
After our drive we visited the beautiful and ancient city of Perugia nearby for an appertivo and dinner. The next day we enjoyed a lovely breakfast of coffee, toast, jams, yogurt, fruit juices and more friendly conversation with our host Andrea. One day is not enough time to spend at Miataland and I wish we could have stayed longer just to hang out and chat. But we had to continue on to the famous Perugina chocolate factory and other destinations. Vacations are always too short, aren't they?
I only wish I could get a job at Miataland and help him regularly exercise his cars and maintain his collection. I definitely hope to return again in the future. Thank you Andrea!
Garage entrance
M2-1001, the crown jewel of the collection in my opinion. Andrea is definitely a NA fan and I think this car is the "best" of the NAs. I was most excited to see this car as I am a huge M2 fan but have never had the privilege to see one in real life. Until now....
Side view. Andrea had to go get this big box of car keys so he could open up the cars in his collection.
Please forgive the photo quality. I was limited to my mobile phone camera and the lighting inside the garage wasn't ideal for taking pictures.
Here is the man himself unlocking the M2-1001 so I could peek inside.
M2-1001 door panel. It will cost you about $1800 to recreate the M2-1001 door panel using Nakamae parts from Rev9: $600 for the door panels (upper and lower), $150 for the 2 point leather pull straps, $400 for the alloy window cranks, $500 for the alloy door levers (not exactly the same as M2-1001 but close enough) plus $150 shipping. I'd love to be able to do this in my own car but I just can't justify it. So I'm doing the poor man's cafe racer with primer3d Forever panels and various aftermarket bits.
M2-1001 bucket seats. Andrea kindly let me sit in his M2-1001, which was a dream come true. It is a tight fit for a fat ass American like me! Even Andrea admits they are a bit tight for him as when he drove the car back home from UK he had to make several rest stops because of them. They're a little bit tighter fitting than the Nakamae Type-R seats I've sampled. Perhaps ideally suited for your average Japanese customer, but even Mazda realized that the seats were somewhat limiting. When they released the M2-1028, they gave customers a choice of seat sizes: S, M or L. Just like when you spec the optional carbon buckets on a Ferrari 488 GTB. How bespoke.
M2-1001 cockpit.
M2-1001 rear finish panel badge
One of two M2-1002 cars at Miataland. One is mostly original condition. The other has been restored. Both are very beautiful cars in person. The blue paint is really a beautiful color. I've read that both M2-1001 and M2-1002 were painted the same "Brave Blue Mica" color but I'm not so sure. They definitely look different in person. The M2-1001 is more black, the M2-1002 is more blue.
Andrea also has a M2-1028 that I saw, but I forgot to take pictures of this car.
I love how the blue paintwork carries over into the interior with the blue dash top and gauge hood. In photos I never really paid attention to that but in person it looks absolutely amazing. And all the woodwork was made by Yamaha using the same materials and techniques as their high-end musical instruments and hifi systems. Photos do not accurately convey the luxurious feeling inside.
Mazda Europes 2010 20th Anniversary Open Race endurance race car for Team Italy. This car is actually street legal now and has license plates and is regularly driven on the road. In fact, this is the same car featured in the excellent CarAdvice article at the bottom of this post. The cars are all stored indoors under cover. But Andrea and his friends regularly exercise all the cars. The goal is to drive each at least once every 2 months if not more often. Given the massive size of the collection, this takes quite some effort! Keeping all the cars running well requires regular maintenance, which they do in the workshop on premises.
Pit Crew Racing
Sunburst Yellow Bugeye Conversion
Mazdaspeed Nopro car. As you will recall, Nogami Project ran a widebody NA Roadster with a turbocharged rotary 13B engine in the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC) GT300 class. This car has the same widebody kit and a whole bunch of Mazdaspeed (Japan) kit parts. Not sure if this was B-spec or what.
Nopro-kitted Mazdaspeed NA.
The wide fenders are needed to fit these wide Panasport G7 multi-piece wheels
Ferrari GTO kit.
Mariner Blue NA
Mariner Blue NA
Here you can see the enormity of the Miataland Garage. I don't know exactly how many cars he has but it's a lot! I'm not even sure if Andrea himself knows the exact number. He's got every color NA made, many limited edition models from around the world, and also several NB and NC models and even the new ND Miata. In addition, he has many other cars besides Miatas. We share very similar tastes in cars. He's got several VWs including Mk2 and Mk3 GTI, Corrado, etc. One thing is for certain, he likes true driver's cars. He has so many I couldn't even begin to photograph them all. Plus I was dying of thirst after the long journey there. So Andrea kindly offered us some water and grapefruit juice to quench our thirst, which was very much appreciated! It also gave me an opportunity to meet his two dogs Eunos and Yata (short for Miata) and see the beautiful renovations he's done on his private residence portion of the property.
View from bedroom suite under construction in the new portion of the property that will soon feature a large reading library with every issue of Road&Ster, Roadster Bros, HyperREV, every Miata book ever written in every language, owner's manuals, brochures, etc. Adnrea even has a Mazda Kodo chair that was a gift directly from Mazda!