Customized cars will star in the San Francisco Auto Salon

Car buffs will have the opportunity to see how paint and imagination can customize an ordinary street car to reflect the owner’s personal taste.

More than 100 of Northern California’s best customized cars will be exhibited in the San Francisco Auto Salon at the International Auto Show, which opens Thursday at the Moscone Center.

“The Salon adds a different dimension to the show,” said Auto Salon organizer John Liwanag. “We take the manufacturers’ cars that people see at the Auto Show and show them how those cars might look.”

Assistant Auto Show Manager Scott Diamond came up with the idea of complementing the new production cars in the show with the after-market and modified cars in 2012.

“But I quickly learned it was a tight-knit community and it was hard to get a foot in the door,” said Diamond

He found the key when he contacted Liwanag, a Southern California transplant to the Bay Area, who had modified his own 1997 Honda when he was only 19 years old.

“John was well connected with the people who had the cars that we wanted in the show,” Diamond said. “He had some reservations in the beginning about getting involved with the event, but still agreed to help us out.”

Modified cars were first exhibited at the auto show in what was called the After-Market Alley. Liwanag provided four modified vehicles that year, along with some race cars and a “mixed bag” of other vehicles. He brought in more vehicles for each of the next two years.

“By that time, I wanted more space to showcase aftermarket vehicles that would interest a younger demographic,” said Diamond.

The plan was to give adventuresome vehicle owners something they would relate to and to intrigue a wider audience with vehicles they wouldn’t see in the manufacturers’ displays.

Diamond wad a bit surprised, but pleased when Liwanag wanted to be involved in the project.

The modified car exhibit was moved in 2012 to the Esplanade Ballroom. There was one little glitch. The ballroom is on an upper level of the center. Cars had to be transported up to the ballroom one-by-one in the freight elevator.

However the larger exhibit space was an opportunity for Liwanag to create the exhibition of modified cars that he thought they deserved. His goal was to reach folks that might not go to an after-market-only show.

“The International Auto Show is an avenue for our cars to be seen outside our normal venues and by a much larger audience,” said Liwanag. “I am not surprised it became popular.”

He was not expecting the exhibition to become almost prestigious for modified vehicle owners to participate in the show.

“It has come to be the place to be,” said Liwanag. “People are coming and asking to be in it.”

“Modified customized car owners are attracted by the diversity of the cars and diversity of owners that may not see each other for months,” Liwanag said. “They get to interact and talk about cars.”

His own orange VIP was displayed in the 2016 show.

“Sixty-two years ago, this was the Import Car Show, then the American manufacturers joined us,” said show Director Kevin Diamond.

“The Auto Salon’s modified cars add a different dimension and with the additional space we have due to the remodeling of Moscone Center we have moved them to the main floor where attendees may view them along-side all the latest vehicles from the world’s major manufacturers.”