This illuminated sign is an original unit made for the Mizwa Motor Sales Corporation in the 1990s. Mizwa was the sole importer of Porsche vehicles into Japan for the better part of 45 years before the automaker took over in 1997.
The first Porsches were imported into Japan in 1953, relatively early in the automaker’s existence, at first just two cars were brought into the country, followed by 10 more in 1955 – all Porsche 356s.
The marque was still all but unknown in Japan at the time though this slowly changed as more cars were delivered, and Porsche became a sought after cult sports car.
This sign was likely hung outside of one of the Mizwa Porsche dealerships in Japan, it’s now a highly collectible piece of Porsche history.
By the mid 1960s the newer Porsche 911 model was being imported however it could only be bought by people with “high character” and they were staggeringly expensive, selling for 4.35 million yen. This works out to approximately 37 million yen today, or roughly $275,000 USD.
Over the years the Japanese relationship with Porsche would grow exponentially and a car modification and tuning culture would grow around the 356 and 911, the most famous of which would be the controversial RWB or RAUH-Welt Begriff founded by Akira Nakai.
The sign is in full working order, and it measures in at 130cm in width by 33cm in height, or approximately 51.18 inches in width by 12.99 inches in height.
This illuminated sign was likely hung in one of the many Mizwa dealerships in Japan, and as you can see it includes the Porsche logo, the “Sole Importer in Japan” tagline, and the Mizwa logo. It’s in fully working condition and is now being offered for sale on Collecting Cars out of Shropshire in the United Kingdom.
It measures in at 130cm in width by 33cm in height, and it was originally made by Baron Signs Ltd in the UK which is a company known for producing official automotive company signs and displays.
If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can visit the listing here.
Images courtesy of Collecting Cars
Articles that Ben has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
