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GROSSE POINTE SHORES — All eyes will be on and around the Edsel and Eleanor Ford House the weekend of June 19-21 as the 39th annual EyesOn Design fundraising car show and related events bring some of the most beautiful and unique vehicles to metro Detroit.
EyesOn Design itself will take place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 21 on the grounds of the Ford House. Reservations and tickets are required for the popular Private Eyes brunch from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., but tickets to just the car show can be purchased at the gate; they’re $40 per person, with free admission for active-duty military with identification, and children under 10 with an adult. Admission includes a collectible program. The theme this year is Power and Elegance.
“It is a world-class car show, and it is here in our backyard,” said EOD Chair Kathy Pecar Lightbody, who has been involved in the event for the last 20 years.
The cars come from 24 states and Canada, she said. EOD is special in that automotive designers are the judges, and vehicles are evaluated on design as opposed to other criteria.
“These are cars that, unless you’re willing to do some significant traveling, you’d never see them all in one place,” Lightbody said.
Attendees don’t need to be car buffs to appreciate EOD.
“You don’t have to know about cars, because it is so well explained,” Lightbody said of exhibition panels and the program.
Visitors this year will see an array of vehicles in about 20 categories, including exotic sports cars from the 1980s and 1990s; full-sized American luxury cars and convertibles from the 1960s and 1970s; and classic American and European roadsters, among many others.
Six remarkable Duesenbergs will be on display, including a Model J Weymann St. Cloud.
“Those really are the epitome of power and elegance,” Lightbody said.
The Petersen Automotive Museum of Los Angeles has been named the winner of the 2026 Preserving the Vision award. Two vehicles from its collection will be at EOD — a 1939 Delahaye Type 165 roadster built for the 1939 New York World’s Fair by French luxury brand and coachbuilder Figoni and Falaschi, and a one-of-a-kind 1952 Ferrari 212/225 Barchetta, the last one ever made and a gift from Enzo Ferrari that was built for Henry Ford II.
Another highlight will be a collection of work by Rob Ida, a third-generation coachbuilder, designer and fabricator who’s the recipient of EOD’s Inspired by Design award. It will include a 1950 Jaguar XK120, and a 1973 Mercedes 600 Pullman six-door limousine once owned by Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu and reimagined by Ida to erase the car’s ugly past.
In addition to cars, there will be a special exhibit — “The Art of the Designer” — on the grounds. It will feature original artwork created by retired automotive designers from General Motors, Ford and Nissan, including work by Glen Durmisevich, Kuni Ito, Chris Gamble, Garen Nicoghosian, Camilo Pardo and Dick Ruzzin. The works showcase traditional and digital design.
EOD’s symposiums — for which tickets can be purchased at the door — are another highlight of the weekend. Geoff Hacker will lead the program, “Fabulous Fiberglass: Celebrating America’s Lost Automotive Treasures” from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. June 20 at the Ford House, followed by a talk by Leslie Kendall about the Petersen Automotive Museum from noon to 2 p.m. June 20 at the Ford House.
Gorden Wagener, recently retired chief design officer for Mercedes-Benz Group AG, has been named this year’s EyesOn Design Lifetime Design Achievement Award winner. Prior to joining Mercedes-Benz in 1997, Wagener was an exterior designer for Volkswagen, Mazda and General Motors.
“We are excited to celebrate Mr. Gorden Wagener as the 2026 EyesOn Design Lifetime Design Achievement Award recipient,” EyesOn Design Chief Judge Glen Durmisevich said in a press release. “Mr. Wagener has energized Mercedes-Benz products with beauty, style and purity of design while retaining the brand’s recognition. He was chosen by the past recipients of the award, making this one of the highest forms of peer recognition within the automotive design community.”
Wagener will be recognized during the Vision Honored gala June 19 at the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club in Grosse Pointe Shores.
The EyesOn Design car show and related events are fundraisers for the Detroit Institute of Ophthalmology, which provides programs and services for blind and visually impaired individuals in the region. The DIO is also the research arm of Henry Ford Health.
In addition, EyesOn Design is a critical fundraiser for the DIO’s biennial research congresses — The Eye and the Chip, about artificial vision, and The Eye, the Brain and the Auto — which take place on alternate years. The congresses have been taking place for more than 20 years. Bringing international researchers together has enabled them to share their findings and collaborate, something that has led to important breakthroughs.
The DIO was founded in 1970 by Dr. Philip C. Hessburg, who served as its medical director for decades and created the international research congresses. Hessburg died in October 2024 at age 94, but his legacy lives on, as do the many important medical and vision-related inventions he built during his lifetime.
That EyesOn Design is held at the Ford House seems fitting, given that this is the former estate of Edsel Ford, who was as well known for his automotive design as his philanthropy, and this is the home where he and his wife, Eleanore, raised their children.
“For 39 years, EyesOn Design has found a natural home at Ford House, and that is no accident,” Ford House President and CEO Mark Heppner said by email. “Edsel Ford was one of the most influential design advocates of his era — a man who understood that an automobile could be a work of art. To welcome these extraordinary vehicles onto these grounds, among the gardens and along the lakeshore that the Ford family called home, is to honor that legacy in the most fitting way imaginable. And there is something truly special about sharing that experience on Father’s Day — it is a celebration of design, of heritage, and of the simple joy of exploring something beautiful together as a family.”
The Ford House is located at 1100 Lake Shore Road in Grosse Pointe Shores. For reservations or more information about EyesOn Design, visit eyesondesign.org or call (313) 824-4710.
