History Larry Watson's Personal Photo Collection

Ill take the $475 special please... and dont worry about the sanding and priming.. you can take care of that too.....

Roy

 

So, what did a spider flake top look like?

 

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Probably a lot like this:
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" Here is the back of the car done in deep candy blue on the bottom and metalflake pale blue with cob webbing on the top portion of this Jaguar." Rik

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These are Some cool pics anyone have any idea where i would find those hubcaps on the 1950 Chevy. I saw one at a swApmeet once but was a 14 inch and only 1 ive been looking but had no luck

 

Wow, it has taken me 3 days, but I have been through the whole thing! You grow up idolizing someones style and it takes a thread like this to see just how much of a character Larry Watson was, it's amazing!! Thank You Rik!!!
P.S., I want to built an Econoline van to look just like Larry's 61 pickup, too sweet!
RIP Larry and now sadly Norm Grabowski......

 

Bump as a thank you to Rik, and congratulations on his book project!

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=748055

 

Long live Kustoms, and Rik to fill us in on all the details about them!
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Thanks for putting so much effort into this thread Rik! It's simply amazing. I was bummed to read you put a book out, and it's now sold out. Have to say, I love the mild jobs Larry did: a little clean up, altitude correction, and color does so much! Again, thanks!

 

Back to the top for a great thread. Keep them coming.

 

Hey,

Acrylic resins, both in enamel and lacquer, came into use in 1958-9. I think that was the year General Motors switched over to acrylic lacquer @ their North American plants. Dupont was a big force in the paint business, and given that members of the Dupont family sat on the General Motors Board of Directors, so went GM. with Dupont paints.

Nitrocellulose continued to be offered by some of the smaller paint companies well into the 60's, and is still in use in the refinishing of violins & gee-tars today.


" A government by the people, for the people " my ass !

 

I remember seeing one of the dragsters Larry painted that was in the Florida area for a meet and how impressed I was at the paint.

 

Im inspired. I wanna panel paint somthin!

 

One of the most attractive angles of Larry Watson's 1959 Cadillac. Taken from ground level facing upwards to capture the perfect shape of the rear fenders wings and taillights and give the perfect look at Larry's scalloped and outlined body which accentuate all the great lines of this Cadillac. Larry painted his Caddy first with pearl white and followed by taping of the scallops and outlines. Then followed with Candy Burgundy. The faded photo makes the white look almost yellow and the burgundy almost look candy red. But this this 3/4 rear angle is absolutely perfect in my book. Body work on the Caddy was done by Bill deCarr and the Bear Alignment shop next door to Larry's Rosecrans shop lowered the car to the perfect hight.






Larry Watson's Custom paint work is legendary. And I have shown a lot of photos here on Facebook and on my site Custom Car Photo archive already. But every master has a t least a few high points on his career. And to me the outline paint job that Larry Watson created belong to his highlights in his career. The ability of Larry Watson to use specific colors, paint type and designs to highlight and improve the cars characteristics are incredible. His designs and techniques create instant custom cars out of near factory stock car. A trend that lasted for many years with highlights in the late 1950's and 1960's, and is still being used today.

The car in this photo is an unidentified 1954 Oldsmobile that was mildly customized before Larry went to work on it. The emblems were removed from the car, and the door handles were shaved to highlight the cars beautiful lines. The car was lowered and sat on nice size white wall tires dressed up with color detailed Lancer four bar hubcaps. To further customized the car a set of lake pipes and set of spotlights was mounted. Then Larry went to work and applied a wonderful cream or off-white pearl. He then outlined the body lines and applied a burnt orange candy over the pearl. Then he applied a dark orange thin pinstripe to the outline of this. The huge body of the Oldsmobile almost looks sectioned after Larry was done with it. This is what paint can do. The Oldsmobile also has a white with orange piping interior, and I really like the matching cover over the rear seats with the burnt orange stripes. This 1954 Oldsmobile belongs to the set of my personal Larry Watson favorites.








Here is a nice snapshot from the Larry Watson Collection showing Ron Dulin's 1956 Plymouth in its last Watson paint job. Parked next to is is Larry's personal 1958 T-Bird and the photo was taken at Larry's Rosecrans Blvd shop, most likely in late 1959. Ron's Plymouth was a very stylish mild Custom with some nice subtile modifications. The grille was modified by shortening the stock ends of the bar and replacing the center piece with a 1954 Chevy unit it 5 teeth. All the scripts and handles were shaved from the body and the rear fenders had 2 inch raised fins. The rear wheel opening was raised to get better in balance with the front unit. The stock front bumper was replaced by what looks to be a 55-56 Ford unit. Larry applied at least two paint jobs to this car. The first one was in pearl white with fuchsia panels. And later as we can see in this photo Larry added more panels with fogging to the car in purple and white with a wide white pin stripe. Ron added four bar lancer hubcaps, dummy spots and lake pipes, the rage in the late 1950's.






This 1954 Mercury is another one of my favorite Watson paint jobs. Candy red with pale gold outlines on this milady de-chromed Mercury. And once again Larry knew exactly which color to pick and how wide the outlines needed to be to create just the perfect effect for this body type. Besides the custom paint work the car has a really nice matching custom interior with white tuck & roll with red piping and accents. The Mercury is lowered all around and rolls on wide white wall tires, red wheels with four bar lancer hubcaps. The perfect mild Custom Car... in my eyes.

 

Wow that cream/off white Olds is incredible. He really was a master. Thanks for continuing to post pictures Rik!!!

 

Thank you Rik.....I'm not sure why people are influenced by a certain "school" or Builder, but Larry Watson epitomizes the Custom car for me. Period. The current generation of Custom builders does some outstanding work, but in my opinion, most have missed the boat. Mild Customs were the best Customs for me, I think because they were within reach of a guy commited to having a car that stood out, but didn't require the selling of one's soul to get it done. In a culture of excess in everything, we've not been able to see the value of "less is more"....Not intended to hijack the thread, but I think it needs to be said. Just feast on Larry's work, and compare it to a million other over-chopped, slammed to the rocker Shoeboxes and their GM cousins and maybe it will start to make some sense. Thank you for continuing to treat us to the finest images in the land........Centurion9

 

^^^Perfect.
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Yes the 54 olds and 54 merc are stunning creations from larry and are my personal favorites,it really goes to show that with just paint and very few body mods you can create a master piece,some of the newer builders today could learn a lesson from larry's techniques

 

One of the best looking '54 Mercs ever. And it's all due to the paint job.

 

Love the clean outlines and how much trim remains on the Merc. So cleanly balanced.

 

That Mercury is a stunner.

 

That '54 Merc is so cool.

 

The '54 Merc is stunning, but that Olds is absolutely unreal. Less is indeed more.

 

Keep 'em coming Rik....Miss Larry a lot and this helps immensely !!

 

The 1954 Olds and Mercury are among my all time favorite Larry Watson painted Custom Cars as well.

Larry just knew how wide the outline needed to be, and which color combination worked best for those cars. And he also knew that he only needed pin-striping on the car were it was needed. So separate the two colors, and not to add a hint of the elements the body man had carefully shaved of the body to create smoother lines. To me these cars are really the perfect mild custom cars.


It is only to bad that I know nothing about both cars, an there is only ONE photo of the Mercury in Larry's Collection and two photos of the Oldsmobile.

So here is the other photo of the Oldsmobile... WOW.


This is what I wrote about it on my Facebook.

A while back I showed another photo of this incredible Larry Watson painted 1954 Oldsmobile.
This car is one of my favorite Larry Watson painted Customs, and this side view photo here is the only other photo of this car from the Larry Watson Personal Collection.

This car to me shows the quality of the things Larry Watson could do with color. He knew which colors and graphical elements he needed to use to get the best lines of the car look at its very best. Larry knew when to stop. There are no overdone pin striping to "make up" for removed chrome trip, or out of place added on ornaments anywhere on this car. Larry had the gift that when he looked at a car he could see which color would work the best for the car, and which accents it needed to make it look instantly better than how it came from the factory. And this gift shows the best in a couple of samples Larry created. And shit unidentified 1954 Oldsmobile sure is one of them. The off white pearl paint with the burnt orange outlines are the perfect choice for this milady customized car. And the dummy lake pipes and four bar lancer hubcaps with the color coded centers are the icing on the cake. I which Larry was still here to tell us more about this car, who owned it, and where it went to after these two snapshot were taken.

 

Luv it! Thanks for posting Rik.
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Keepem coming Rik.

 

that olds is incredible, I had seen the merc many times before ( a favorite of mine too) but had never seen that olds before...stunning. Thanks Rik

 

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STUNNING!

 

I have never seen a custom painter who had a better eye for color coordination and who could do so much with a paint job. The colors that he chose were extremely unconventional for the time and would probably seem unappealing by themselves, but on the right car with the right background color, they were magical.

Can you imagine how excited you would be if you were one of the lucky ones who dropped off his car at Watson's on Monday and picked up a masterpiece on Friday? No wonder he had a waiting list a mile long!

 

another cool thing about this one is the 64-65 Impala SS interior.