People’s Choice Car Show and Parade of Garages
Where nostalgia meets new-school exotics at the Carriage Houses of Johnson County—man screw that I want one of them garages!
Although I grew up in Southern California (as a “909’er”), I’ve lived in the Midwest—Shawnee, Kansas to be exact—since late 2005. From spring until fall, it seems every other week that I either run into a long line of cars that are up to something. If it’s not a group of two or three-dozen Corvettes, Porsches, or Hot Rods en route to their yearly planned Sunday drive, it’s sometimes a large group of cars parked down a small town’s Main Street, or in a municipal park.
While most of the show out here primarily feature Detroit muscle, some of them have included a plethora of European exotics like in our KC TRENDS feature. However, my favorites are the ones where you just have a crazy mix of it all—and that was the show this year at the People’s Choice Car Show and Parade of Garages at the Carriage Houses of Johnson County, which was organized in conjunction with the Kansas City Automotive Museum.
I came across this show somewhat by chance, and I had no intention of featuring it. My buddy, Derek, who owns a nice, very low mileage first gen Viper that we should be modifying pretty soon happened to tell me that there is a small car show at the local garages in De Soto, Kansas.
You have to understand that De Soto is even rural for Kansas City, so I wasn’t expecting much. But I didn’t have much to do that afternoon and it was right down the street from where my family and I go to church. So we said, “why not” and hopped in our minivan and went on our 5-minute trek. As soon as I got there, I had regretted not bringing my camera, so I apologize in advance in attempting the best I could with my iPhone. The collection of cars here was worth it.
Not only is the Carriage Houses of Johnson County located in a rural part of Kansas City, the show wasn’t even really advertised. I only heard about it through a friend. To get there, it’s this actual rural street going into De Soto. It’s a nice, scenic road, and I remember spotting over 50 Porsches going through here several weeks back as I sat there at my church’s doorstep drooling and breaking the 10th Commandment (it’s “though shall not covet,” before you ask). Before you know it, you arrive to an area where cars are just everywhere. I didn’t get a shot of it on the way in—like I said, I wasn’t expecting to take any pictures here.
The Carriage Houses of Johnson County is located in De Soto, Kansas, and is home to some of the coolest garages you’ll see. These garages are not for rent—you buy them. And it’s where gear heads maintain their hobbies, either with lifts and actually working on the cars, or simply storage. We’re talking classics, exotics, and RVs. Hey, I remember these winged Z28 Camaros came out around 1991. They were the underrated “230 bhp” cars whipping 0-60 mph in 5.3 seconds. That was really fast back then, and it was as quick as the Ferrari offered that year, the 348.
Here’s what one of the smaller garages looks like. The owners of this one look like they’re into their water sports.
