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The sky’s the limit for a Singer-personalized Porsche.

Starting at around $500,000, Singer Vehicle Design will strip your Porsche 911 and rebuild it with custom details

It's hard not to think of the eye-watering price tag of the Porsche 911 restored by Singer while heading onto a twisty stretch of Vancouver's Marine Drive. But the fixation soon fades.

It takes only a moment to readapt to the old-school bottom-hinged pedals of a Porsche 964 – the factory designation given to 911s built between 1989 and 1994. The absence of sound-deadening technology means the thrum of the rear-mounted 4.0-litre, 390-horsepower, flat-six engine is very present in the cabin. The torquey motor feels tractable at low speeds, not peaky like some hot-rodded Porsches.

Older 911s have always been responsive but the lighter Singer-customized car seems even more attuned to the driver's inputs. The road is still damp from the latest Wet Coast deluge, but the 911 can be confidently pitched into tight turns on the narrow road without fear. Too fast and the massive Brembo brakes quickly scrub speed while its fat rear tires keep things in line.

You don't have to be a diehard enthusiast for vintage, air-cooled 911s to appreciate one restored by Singer Vehicle Design. Raw and benign at the same time, it skillfully marries the legend's classic attributes – and somehow amplifies them.

There are three Singer-customized 911s in Canada.

A 911 "reimagined" by the Los Angeles-based customizer starts around $500,000 at today's exchange rates. One ordered by Chris Pfaff, who heads Toronto-based Pfaff Automotive Partners (which recently became Singer's Canadian retailer), cost almost $1-million, more than nine times the $102,000 starting price of a new 911.

There are plenty of tuners and resto-mod outfits willing to sell a souped-up 911 for much less. But in the eight years since British ex-pat Rob Dickinson created it, Singer has built a reputation for meticulous workmanship and extreme personalization.

The company has completed fewer than 100 jobs since 2009 but at time of writing, had deposits for another 110 on its books, spokeswoman Deb Pollack said. Is a restored 911 really worth that much money?

Faisal Huda owns one of three Singer-customized 911s in Canada. The Toronto businessman was watching an old episode of BBC's Top Gear when he was "mesmerized" by co-host James May's rapturous review. "It had to be one of the most beautiful vehicles to ever cross my gaze," he said in an interview. "I was transfixed, having to rewind the episode a couple times and rewatch just to soak in all the details." Huda talked to Dickinson for almost two hours before ordering Singer's 25th rebuild.

Singer takes about a year and 4,000 man-hours to complete a commission, drawing on some 120 suppliers, located mostly in Southern California. To avoid any misunderstanding that Porsche endorses its work, Singer emphasizes that it neither manufactures nor sells cars. It is not associated with Porsche itself.

Customers supply a Porsche 964, which Singer can help source. The car retains its original VIN and engine block but otherwise is stripped to the bare shell, a blank canvas for the buyer's imagination.

There's little Singer won't do to personalize a car – just don't ask for an automatic transmission. Otherwise, the sky's the limit, from different engine and suspension tunings to interior and exterior finishes.

Huda visited Singer five times while his car was being worked on. He encouraged staff to push the design envelope with its interior, using different colours of leather and suede, specifying a one-off set of rear reflectors, nickel-plated instead of black, and tweaking the paint – Porsche's Geyser Grey Metallic – to make it warmer.

The bright interior of Chris Pfaff’s customized Porsche takes some getting used to.

"I wanted something sporty but elegant at the same time, and something that reeked of retro," he said.

Huda, who's owned a 2013 911 Carrera and had a 2018 Targa 4 GTS on order, is no track-day bandit but likes to drive hard. "I'll never take it out in the rain or if there is residual winter salt still on the road, but I have put something like 6,000 kilometres on the car over two summers," he said.

The Pfaff-commissioned car we drove in Vancouver was finished in Albert Blue, the same as the 1967 911 Pfaff's father owned. For the interior, Pfaff went with red leather and an orange and blue tartan basket-weave trim on the deeply bolstered Recaro seats, dash and door panels. It takes some getting used to.

Singer carved more than 300 pounds out of the 964's 3,000-pound curb weight by replacing all but the roof and doors with carbon-fibre pieces and removing sound-deadening insulation. Even the shift knob is balsa wood.

The flat-six, built by Ed Pink Racing Engines, produces 390 horsepower compared with the stock 3.6-litre's 250 horsepower. Customers can order 3.8-litre versions producing 300 to 350 horsepower.

Still, the question remains: Is a Singer-restored Porsche's extreme bespoke quality and satisfying driver experience worth the cost? After all, a $300 Seiko watch will provide the time much the same as a $60,000 hand-finished Patek Philippe Calatrava. Similarly, a run-of-the-mill sedan will get you from point A to point B, much the same as a Singer Porsche.

How you travel that road is your call.

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