Classic cars and pin-up models go together like peanut butter and jelly, and that’s probably why Jordan Warran, owner of a ‘52 Buick Super gets along so well with local pin-up model Bianca Bombshell.
Warran, whose family owns Otter Point Collison, works as a body man at the shop and said he has loved cars all his life.
“I’m just a gearhead. I just like wrenching on anything just to keep busy,” said Warran.
“I just don’t like sitting around, I don’t like video games and I don’t like a lot of other stuff so I just play with cars and bikes and anything.”
The last couple of years, his main focus has been a semi-gloss green 1952 Buick Super that looks like a lime-coloured getaway car in a Humphrey Bogart gangster movie. With a hunkered-down stance hovering a few precarious inches above the ground, it retains the original straight-8 engine, but that’s about it — the rest of the car is either a mish-mash of Cadillac parts like blinker lights from a ‘51 and mirror-polish hubcaps from a ‘53, or custom additions like door panels made from recycled street signs and vintage blankets covering the seats.
A man of few words, Warran could be a shy senior trapped in an 23-year-old’s body — he doesn’t have a phone or Internet and prefers to spend most of his time in a garage.
“I have no way for anyone to get a hold of me but show up. I’m old school, I collect old stuff, old junk.”
That hasn’t stopped his Buick from drawing plenty of attention though, thanks in part to a chance meeting with Bombshell last year. A friend from Warren’s highschool days at Edward Milne knew a professional photographer that Bombshell had met on the Internet. The rest, she said, is history.
Like the car, Bombshell is originally from Victoria. Moving into town about a year ago, she is also tech-deprived by choice and chose Sooke as her new home because “it feels more spiritual.” The two were introduced and since then the duo has become a formidable force — since last spring, working with new-to-Sooke photographer named Cat Tetreault, they have been featured in several publications such as the retro-themed Drive-In and American pin-up magazine Retro Lovely where Bombshell has graced the cover and Warran’s car, in its pages.
“Just like Jordan I love old, crappy stuff,” said a giggling Bombshell who bears a striking resemblance to Jessica Rabbit except with curly blonde hair. “Ever since I was a little girl I’ve loved pin-up girls, everyone does I think.” Educated in international hospitality management, her heart was never in it.
“Ever since I was little people have told me you should model, but I’m super curvy and the modelling world today is super thin. And so I never really found a place that I fit and now I fit.”
At 27, she is hoping to turn modelling into a paid career, but in the meantime is content serving at the era-appropriate diner Mom’s Cafe while increasing her exposure that she said has spiralled out of control since meeting Warran. For the young car enthusiast, he has simpler goals.
“(I’m going to) put it away for the winter and drive it in the summertime and enjoy it, and just have fun.”
You can catch the pair in the the latest No. 7 issue of Retro Lovely on magazine stands now or online at www.retrolovelymagazine.com.