Henri Chapron: The French Coachbuilder Behind the Delahaye 235 and Hotchkiss-Grégoire Coupé
- Jun 4
- 8 min read
Updated: Jun 12
Before he built cars for presidents and royality, Henri Chapron (1886-1978) was a boy on a bicycle with a toolbox, chasing a craft that would carry him from humble beginnings to the highest circles of automotive history.
In the golden age of coachbuilding, many of the finest automobiles began as a chassis and engine. The body, style and personality were entrusted to specialists known in France as carrossiers, or coachbuilders. They were part engineer, part sculptor and part tailor. Among the greatest of them was Henri Chapron, a French craftsman whose name became closely associated with elegance, restraint and hand-built automotive beauty.
After World War I, Chapron opened his first workshop in Neuilly-sur-Seine and began building bodies on surplus Ford chassis left behind in France after the war. From those practical beginnings, he built one of France’s most respected coachbuilding houses, later operating from Levallois-Perret. His workshop created custom bodies for marques such as Delage, Delahaye, Hispano-Suiza, Talbot-Lago, Hotchkiss, Grégoire, Citroën and others.
Chapron’s success was not only the story of a designer’s hand, but also the story of a sharp business mind and a disciplined eye. He often entrusted drawings to skilled designers while retaining final authority over proportion, finish and detail. In the postwar years, one of the most important creative voices behind the Chapron look was independent designer Carlo Delaisse.
By 1927, his company had about 350 employees and was capable of delivering as many as three cars per day. His designs were known for their sober elegance. They were graceful without being excessive, modern without losing balance and unmistakably French in their sense of proportion.
By the mid-1930s, Chapron’s work had reached the highest levels of French public life. His official history records that in 1934 he built his first automobile for the Presidency of the Republic at the request of President Albert Lebrun.
World War II interrupted the momentum of Chapron’s business. His Levallois-Perret workshops were requisitioned, and tools and unfinished vehicles had to be moved away from Paris. Rather than abandon his employees, Chapron shifted the workshop toward survival work, including coal stoves, wooden carts, gas-generator installations and maintenance for the few vehicles still on the road. It was not glamorous work, but it kept the craft alive. When peace returned, Chapron was still standing, ready to reshape French coachbuilding for a changed world.
The 1952 Delahaye 235: Performance in Chapron Beauty
One of the Chapron-bodied automobiles in the Tampa Bay Automobile Museum collection is the 1952 Delahaye 235.
Delahaye was one of the great names in French automotive history, dating back to 1894. Known for competition success and refined grand touring cars, Delahaye introduced the 235 as a postwar successor to the celebrated 135 MS.
The Type 235 was the last Delahaye, with production of only 83 cars. The museum’s car was purchased by Mr. Huard of Établissements Huard and delivered to Henri Chapron for its custom bodywork. Chapron issued a pro forma invoice on June 11, 1952 for 1,800,000 francs.
Mr. Huard requested that Chapron eliminate the small windows behind the doors, making this body unique. As with all Delahaye 235 models, the grille was supplied by Delahaye and incorporated into the coachbuilt body. Chapron completed the work in about three months.
The result is a rare grand touring automobile that combines Delahaye performance with Chapron’s restrained elegance. Beneath its sculpted body is a 3.5-liter six-cylinder engine paired with a Cotal 4-speed electrically operated preselector gearbox. It is a car with the manners of a salon and the bones of a road machine, all wrapped in Chapron’s tailored postwar style.
The Delahaye 235 also marked the closing chapter of a much larger French luxury story. Postwar taxes, rising production costs and changing tastes made cars like this increasingly difficult to sell. Delahaye production fell sharply in the early 1950s, and in 1954 the company was absorbed by Hotchkiss, bringing an era of French grand touring automobiles to an end.
The 1952 Hotchkiss-Grégoire Cabriolet: Royal Provenance and Radical Engineering
The Hotchkiss-Grégoire Cabriolet continues the story of postwar French ambition, but in a very different form. Where the Delahaye 235 represented the last breath of traditional French grand touring luxury, the Hotchkiss-Grégoire pointed toward the future.
Developed by engineer Jean-Albert Grégoire, the Hotchkiss-Grégoire was one of the most advanced French automobiles of its time. It used front-wheel drive, fully independent suspension, an aluminum structure and a horizontally opposed, water-cooled four-cylinder engine. Its low drag, strong road holding and impressive fuel economy drew attention when the model debuted at the October 1951 Paris Motor Show.
Its innovation made it difficult and expensive to build. The structure relied heavily on Alpax aluminum castings, many of which were complex to produce and sometimes had to be melted down and recast. The hand-formed aluminum body panels added even more cost, especially on the rare examples bodied by Henri Chapron.
Only 247 Hotchkiss-Grégoire cars were produced between 1950 and 1953. Of those, just seven were coupés and only five were convertibles with bodies hand made by Chapron.
The Tampa Bay Automobile Museum’s 1952 Grégoire Cabriolet is one of those five. Formerly owned by Thailand’s royal family, it brings together two sides of Chapron’s postwar work: advanced engineering beneath the surface and aristocratic elegance in every visible line.
The 1953 Hotchkiss-Grégoire Coupé: Aluminum, Innovation and New York History
The museum is also home to another remarkable Chapron-bodied automobile: the 1953 Hotchkiss-Grégoire Coupé, car #1248.
This car represents a very different side of Chapron’s work. While the Delahaye 235 reflects traditional French luxury, the Hotchkiss-Grégoire shows how Chapron could also clothe advanced engineering.
The Hotchkiss-Grégoire was developed by Hotchkiss with French engineer Jean-Albert Grégoire and Aluminium Français. Grégoire had already helped pioneer aluminum automobile construction with the Amilcar Compound in 1937. After World War II, he continued this work with a new front-wheel-drive automobile that used aluminum extensively throughout its construction.
The new prototype featured front-wheel drive, fully independent suspension, a flat-four engine and an aluminum frame designed to accommodate five passengers. Its top speed at 93 mph and its fuel economy at 26 miles per gallon.
Several Hotchkiss-Grégoire chassis received bodies designed by Henri Chapron on the existing aluminum frame. The museum’s car, # 1248, was the first coupé and was prepared for shipment to New York in 1953, where Jean-Albert Grégoire attended the show and presented the car.
Chapron sent a pro forma invoice on March 3, 1952 for 1,030,482 francs. The Grégoire was delivered to Chapron on April 12, 1952, and his workshop completed the body, upholstery, wiring and painting in only three months.
In 1953, car # 1248 was shipped to New York, where Grégoire presented the Hotchkiss-Grégoire to American audiences. Ed Cole, then involved with Chevrolet’s Corvette program, purchased the coupé from Grégoire for General Motors. Cole may have drawn inspiration from the car’s leaping impala badge and its advanced use of aluminum engineering.
The 1955 Salmson 2300S: A Final French Grand Tourer
The Salmson 2300S was introduced in 1953 as the company’s final sporting automobile. Although based on a shortened version of the earlier Randonnée chassis, the 2300S was transformed into a more glamorous grand tourer with a tuned 2.3-liter twin-cam four-cylinder engine producing 105 bhp at 5000 rpm. Paired with a four-speed Cotal electrically controlled gearbox, it was capable of about 112 mph.
he model was developed with the influence of racing driver Eugène Martin, whose earlier sports coupés helped inspire Salmson’s new direction. Early 2300S bodies used panels supplied by Esclassan, but production soon shifted to Henri Chapron. Chapron first supplied body panels, then developed his own revised shell, which was longer, wider, more rigid and better sealed against the weather. By late 1955, Chapron had taken over complete building and finishing of the cars.
Since the 2300S evolved through several body variations during its short production life, surviving cars often differ in small details. This makes the model an especially fascinating example of late French coachbuilding, where handwork, refinement and constant adjustment still shaped each automobile.
The 2300S also had a brief but notable competition career, with rally success in the mid-1950s and appearances at Le Mans. Despite its advanced engineering and Chapron coachwork, the car arrived too late to save Salmson’s automobile division. Automobile production ended in the 1950s, leaving the 2300S as Salmson’s final and most sophisticated road car.
Citroën and the Reinvention of Chapron
By the 1950s, the world of coachbuilding had changed dramatically. Automobile manufacturers were increasingly building complete cars in-house with self-supporting bodies, leaving less room for independent coachbuilders. Many famous coachbuilding firms disappeared during this period.
Chapron adapted.
His later career became closely tied to Citroën. After the launch of the revolutionary Citroën DS in 1955, Chapron recognized that its futuristic engineering could support a new form of French luxury. At the 1958 Paris Salon, he unveiled a DS cabriolet, and the design attracted enough attention that Citroën later brought the model into its official catalog. Chapron’s workshops went on to build factory-authorized DS Décapotables, Prestige models, special saloons and presidential cars, helping preserve the tradition of hand-built French coachwork deep into the age of industrial production.
Chapron’s Citroën work expanded beyond cabriolets. His workshop produced DS coupes, special saloons and presidential cars. He also worked on the Maserati-powered Citroën SM, including formal bodies and presidential vehicles. These cars helped keep the coachbuilding tradition alive even as the wider industry moved toward standardized production.
Two of Chapron’s most dramatic later creations were the Citroën SM Mylord cabriolet and the SM Opéra sedan, both introduced in the early 1970s. He also built the SM Présidentielle, a ceremonial four-door open car produced in two examples for the French state. These cars were among the last great flourishes of French coachbuilding, formal yet futuristic, ceremonial yet unmistakably modern.
A Lasting Legacy
Henri Chapron died in Paris in 1978 at the age of 92. His widow, Françoise Chapron, continued operating the workshop for a time, focusing on restoration, luxury conversions, prototype work and special projects. Without Chapron himself, the company struggled against rising costs and newer competitors. Françoise Chapron filed for bankruptcy in October 1985, and liquidation followed that December. With it, one of the last great independent French coachbuilding houses disappeared from the automotive scene.
Chapron’s legacy lives on in the automobiles he shaped. His cars were not simply bodies placed over mechanical parts. They were carefully tailored objects, where engineering, proportion and craftsmanship met.
The Tampa Bay Automobile Museum, offers visitors a rare look at the final great era of French coachbuilding, when automobiles could still be shaped by hand and beauty could be measured in every curve.