Bridgehampton's Favorite Weekend: The Bridge Turns 10
There are automotive gatherings where the objective is immediately understood: judging, trophies, provenance, lap times, auction results. And then there is The Bridge.
Photography by Tony Laiacona, Chris Jeyes, Huseyin Erturk and Michael Foster
On a brilliant September afternoon in Bridgehampton, the distinction was apparent almost immediately. Here, across the rolling grounds of a former race circuit, some of the world’s most remarkable automobiles appeared not as competitors, but almost as objects within an enormous outdoor exhibition—placed among the landscape, architecture and remnants of one of American motorsport’s more fascinating settings.
For its 10th anniversary, The Bridge X, presented by Mercedes-Benz USA, returned to The Bridge golf club with the kind of automotive collection that would be extraordinary almost anywhere else: multiple Mercedes-Benz 300 SLs, generations of Porsche 911 RS models, sixteen Ferrari Testarossas, competition cars spanning more than seven decades, and a field populated by supercars and hypercars from across the automotive world.
Yet the appeal of The Bridge has never been entirely about assembling the rarest cars in one place. It is about how they are assembled.
A Concours Without the Concours
The absence of judging may be The Bridge’s greatest luxury. There are no scorecards tucked beneath windscreen wipers, no judges inspecting stitching and engine bays, and no procession toward a podium. The cars simply exist within the landscape, allowing design, history and occasionally eccentricity to become the conversation.
That philosophy felt particularly appropriate for the tenth edition.
Color has long played an important role in the visual language of The Bridge, and this year the grounds became an almost painterly study of the automobile. White Porsche 911 RS models appeared together across generations; elsewhere, Porsches moved through an ombré of greens. Ferraris, too, departed from the expected Rosso Corsa, appearing in varying shades of green.
Then came the Testarossas. Sixteen of them stretched across the driving range—a wonderfully excessive congregation of one of the defining shapes of the 1980s and early 1990s. Nearby, a starting grid on Paddock Four assembled racing machinery dating from the 1950s through the present. The result felt less like a traditional car show and more like walking through an exhibition in which the curators happened to have several hundred acres at their disposal.
And that landscape matters. Long before golf arrived here, engines did.
Where Racing Came First
The manicured grounds beneath the cars conceal a considerably louder past. Designed by Grumman engineers and built in 1957, the original Bridgehampton Race Circuit stretched across more than 500 acres overlooking Peconic Bay. Created in the wake of New York’s ban on racing on public roads, the circuit would become an important chapter in postwar American motorsport—and even today, that history remains palpable.
Walking the property, now defined by immaculate fairways and carefully considered hospitality spaces, it is difficult not to imagine what this landscape once sounded like at speed. When the property later faced the prospect of development, Robert Rubin stepped in to preserve it, acquiring the circuit in 1981 and eventually establishing The Bridge golf club on the site in 2002.
That preservation ultimately provided the foundation for what The Bridge has become today. The annual gathering is a collaboration between Rubin; Shamin Abas, President of Shamin Abas Associates; and Jeffrey Einhorn, a Manhattan-based attorney and longtime car collector. Together, they have created an event that feels inseparable from the history of the land on which it takes place.
For today’s guests, that connection between past and present gives the gathering a sense of authenticity that would be nearly impossible to recreate elsewhere. At an event devoted to automobiles whose significance is so often defined by history, provenance and preservation, there could hardly be a more appropriate setting.
Mercedes-Benz: 140 Years in Motion
This year’s anniversary carried another significant number. Presenting sponsor Mercedes-Benz is celebrating 140 years since Carl Benz’s 1886 patent for what is widely recognized as the first automobile, and the marque’s presence was integrated throughout the event rather than confined to a conventional display.
At its center was “Lines of Motion,” an installation extending from The Bridge Pro Shop into the surrounding grounds. Color, form and movement were used to interpret the progression from Benz’s earliest invention to the company’s contemporary performance and technological ambitions. The cars provided the punctuation.
Historic Mercedes-Benz models shared the property with contemporary machinery, including the Mercedes-AMG ONE, creating the sort of juxtaposition that makes 140 years of automotive evolution suddenly tangible.
One could move from the proportions and mechanical elegance of a 300 SL to a modern hypercar shaped by Formula One technology without ever leaving the lawn. That contrast—heritage without nostalgia—became one of the more compelling themes of the afternoon.
Beyond the Automobile
What has increasingly distinguished The Bridge, however, is its understanding that automotive collecting rarely exists in isolation. Collectors tend to collect.
Watches, tailoring, architecture, furniture, art, aircraft and automobiles frequently occupy the same cultural orbit, and The Bridge X leaned deliberately into that intersection. The official program expanded across horology, fashion, aviation, design and luxury lifestyle, turning the afternoon into something considerably broader than an automotive gathering.
Breguet offered perhaps the most literal demonstration of craftsmanship. Inside its working atelier, a Master Guillocheur demonstrated traditional guilloché using an antique rose-engine machine while a Master Watchmaker assembled and disassembled movements nearby.
Among the pieces on display were the experimental Experimentale 1, the GPHG-winning Souscription 2025BH and six tourbillons commemorating 225 years since Abraham-Louis Breguet patented the tourbillon. Particularly appropriate to the surroundings were historic automotive timepieces connected to the Bugatti Royale and Lamborghini Diablo.
The relationship between watchmaking and automobiles can occasionally feel like a marketing construction. Here, watching the work being performed rather than merely looking at finished products, the connection between mechanical precision, obsessive detail and craftsmanship felt considerably more convincing.
Elsewhere, Mytheresa created the event’s luxury fashion environment with a men’s lounge combining a curated wardrobe with bespoke tailoring, shoe shining and cigars.
Twisted Automotive arrived with two bespoke classic Land Rover Defenders, each representing more than 2,500 hours of craftsmanship, while Expedition Motor Company presented a Mercedes-Benz 250GD Wolf transformed from its former European military life through an extensive frame-off restoration.
Ferrari North America occupied the croquet lawn. Spyker made its Bridge debut with the limited-edition C8 Preliator XXV. Aston Martin presented a pair of bespoke vehicles. The automotive landscape continually shifted between preservation, restoration, reinterpretation and outright performance.
Even the sky became part of the conversation.
Blade, now a Joby company, displayed a full-scale model of Joby’s S4 electric aircraft, while Pivotal brought its electric aircraft to the grounds for demonstrations—a reminder that the same questions of mobility, technology and design reshaping the automobile are increasingly moving vertically.
A Little Theater
For all the seriousness of the machinery, The Bridge has retained an important sense of humor. A new Americana-inspired drive-in theater vignette placed cars and chairs around a hypercut of founder Robert Rubin’s favorite automotive films, complete with popcorn. Nearby, a vintage taxi stand and bus stop featured a 1973 GMC New Look Bus surrounded by yellow sports cars assuming the role of cabs. Artists added another layer by “tagging” a cardboard Mason Williams bus artwork.
These moments are important because they keep The Bridge from becoming overly precious. There is an inherent absurdity to the world of serious collecting—objects designed originally for transportation becoming sculpture, investments and historical artifacts—and the most successful gatherings understand that reverence and enjoyment do not have to be mutually exclusive. The Bridge seems particularly comfortable with both.
The Next Generation of Collecting
Volvo offered another perspective on that evolution. The marque returned with the debut of its new all-electric EX60, unveiled alongside a live performance by pianist and composer Chloe Flower. Surrounding it was a miniature timeline of Volvo history: a 1957 PV444E, 1972 P1800E, 1995 850 T-5R, 2026 XC90 T8 and the 2027 EX60.
Placed within an event overwhelmingly informed by history, the display raised an interesting question without needing to state it explicitly: What will the next generation choose to collect?
Today’s collector landscape is increasingly comfortable crossing eras and disciplines. A garage might contain an analog sports car, an electric daily driver and a modern hypercar. A vintage watch can coexist with contemporary design. Restoration can mean absolute originality or radical reinterpretation. The boundaries have softened, and perhaps that is why The Bridge feels particularly relevant at ten years old.
Ten Years Later
The weekend extended beyond Saturday’s invitation-only gathering. Cars & Coffee, presented by 1600 Veloce at the Bridgehampton Museum, opened the experience to the public on Sunday morning, while the weekend concluded at Topping Rose House with a garden gathering celebrating Mercedes-Benz’s 140th anniversary.
Limited to 500 guests, the finale combined Mercedes-Benz automobiles with cuisine from Chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten, with ticket proceeds benefiting Heart of the Hamptons and its work providing food and emergency assistance to local families, seniors and individuals in need.
The tenth anniversary was also commemorated with a limited-edition capsule collection and a special book documenting both the property and the event’s history. But perhaps the most compelling marker of ten years wasn’t something that could be purchased or displayed.
Many automotive events can assemble important cars. Fewer can create a setting in which a Testarossa, a Breguet tourbillon, a bespoke Defender, an electric aircraft and a perfectly tailored jacket somehow belong to the same conversation.
By late afternoon, as the September light stretched across the former circuit, the cars appeared less like exhibits waiting to be judged and more like pieces of a much larger portrait of collecting. That may ultimately be The Bridge’s achievement after a decade. It has never really been about deciding which automobile is best.
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