In December 2023 I wrote to a classic car dealer in Fredericia. They had just sold a black '67 Fastback, I fell completely in love with the idea, and I had a bit of money sitting in a savings account. They told me they had found a '68 in the US that would be in Denmark within three to six months.
I ended up waiting for nearly seven, because the car was held up in customs and sat in a container in an American port, and in the end they called me with a completely different suggestion.
A body shell and a phone call
They worked with a man on Zealand, where I live too, who builds Mustangs as a hobby next to his full-time job. He had found a '67, which is my dream year, as nothing but a body shell somewhere in North Jutland, and he was looking for someone to build it for. It sounded almost too good to be true.
We were introduced, I called him, and we talked for a while about what I was dreaming of. It was a good match, so I went to see the car, which at that point was nothing but a bare body. We agreed to do it together, and he got started straight away. If I remember right, mine is the 30th or 40th Mustang he has built, and he has owned plenty of classic cars over the years himself, so there was a lot for me to learn from him.
Every part, down to the chrome
After a while we met to go through the parts. We had to decide everything, from the steering wheel and the wheels to the seats, the grille and where there should and should not be chrome. Even the colour was open for a long time: I started out thinking black, because I love things that are all black, then I was leaning towards a shade of blue, and it ended up green.
We agreed on almost everything. The one thing we did not agree on, where I got my way, was that I wanted seats with headrests. The '67 seats do not have them, so he found two seats from a '69, had them reupholstered on Funen, and I got it the way I wanted it. Somewhere else on Funen he found a man with a stash of original '67 parts, the center console among them, so that one has real patina. Everything that could be found original is original, and everything else is as close as it gets.
From the bare body to the finished car took eight months.
Picking it up
I picked it up on June 26, 2025, and it felt like a dream, completely unreal. The first drive home was a pure joy, even though I had to get to know the car first, because there is a bit of a difference between this one and the Tesla we drive day to day.
There were a few small fixes after I got it, but apart from that it has run like a dream ever since. When the seasons change, I drive it up to its builder, and he gives it a service, so we know it is doing well.
Sunday drives, and winters under wraps
In winter it stands still, wrapped up in an underground parking garage. In summer I drive it as much as makes sense to me: Sunday drives along Strandvejen, trips to family and friends, pretty much everything except long journeys and drives that are mostly motorway. Over the summer it replaces 99% of my Tesla driving.
What surprised me most
Fuel has become expensive, I will not pretend otherwise. What surprised me most, though, is how people react. I never imagined that people would take pictures, film it or ask me to rev the engine so they can hear it, and it is quite something. People want to talk to you and ask about the car, and when it is parked and I am not with it, they walk around it, look in through the windows and take photos. Everyone is happy and excited about it, which only makes me like it even more.
At a classic car meet, with plenty of other beautiful old cars around, a man came over and asked about mine. As soon as I told him who had built it, he asked if he could see the engine bay. Of course he could, so I popped the hood and went to look at the other cars. When I looked back, he had called five or ten other people over, all of them wanting to see the builder's latest project. That was when I really understood how skilled and respected he is in that world.
My advice
If you are in Denmark and thinking about your first American classic, my advice is this: do not wait as many years as I did.
