The BMW Group’s Rolls-Royce Motor Car Company is serious about working with clients to build them exactly the Rolls-Royce they want. This was never more obvious than last week during the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance when car collector Michael Fux took delivery of his brand new, one-of-a-kind Rolls-Royce Wraith in Aequus Green and Cornish White.
Michael Fux is a businessman and philanthropist who founded Sleep Innovations and is now the CEO of Comfort Revolution. He is literally living the American dream, since he and his family emigrated from Cuba in 1958 with practically nothing when Michael was 15. Since then he has created, bought, and sold a number of companies and in the process, has acquired the means to become a serious collector of performance and exotic cars.
He seems to have an affinity for cars in bold colors. Among the 130 vehicles in his collection are bright red, blue, and yellow Ferraris, bright green and orange Lamborghinis, and jet black Porsches and Mercedes-Benzes.
But the cars with the most extreme and unusual colors seem to be his Rolls-Royces. He has them in white, yellow, purple, and a Drophead Phantom Coupe in a shade of red that is so unique that Rolls-Royce named the color after him and will only use it on his cars.
Under the hood of the Rolls-Royce Wraith that he recently picked up at Pebble Beach is a made-by-BMW 630-horsepower V12 mated to an eight-speed automatic transmission.
The exterior color, which is also described as Fux Intense Jade Pearl, is carried into the interior’s leather and veneer finishes, lamb’s wool floor mats, steering wheel, instrument dials, dashboard, speaker covers, and rear view mirror housing. The few things on the inside that aren’t Jade Pearl are matte black or chrome.
Collecting special cars and building companies are not Michael Fux’s only passions. He funded the Michael Fux Family Center at Miami Children’s Hospital, and created the Michael Fux Foundation to help sick and underprivileged children and their families. He regularly presents his car collection as a backdrop for various charity fundraising events.
Rolls-Royce automobiles are not the only BMW Group products in which he is interested. For example, he co-drove a 1937 BMW 328 in the 2011 Mille Miglia. He didn’t stray too far from the Rolls-Royce connection, however, since his co-driver was Torsten Mueller-Oetvoes, CEO of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars. More recently, a year ago at Pebble Beach he was one of the select group of BMW clients to take delivery of the first BMW i8s sold to customers in the United States. We certainly can’t fault him for his color choice of the Crystal White Pearl Metallic with BMW i Frozen Blue accents, but then, the i8 is dazzling in any of its factory colors.
As Michael Fux enjoys his BMWs and Rolls-Royces and other amazing cars, we hope you enjoy this brief video produced by Rolls-Royce about one of its best customers.—Scott Blazey
[Video courtesy of Rolls-Royce. Photos courtesy of BMW AG and Rush Lane.]
