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Good afternoon fellow Packard enthusiasts,

My husband and I just bought a 1923 Packard Single-Six Runabout from Peters Motorcars in Norwalk, Ohio. This Packard was part of the Roderick Blood collection. It was last restored in 1966 after his death. It is a robin's egg blue color; however, we are searching for the correct Packard color name for this year. We know it is not Packard Blue which is a very dark blue. We live near the Packard Proving Grounds in Shelby Township, Michigan, and are hoping there are resources there that may help us. We would like to know if a Packard customer in 1923 could order any color he or she wished at the dealership. Or was this robin's egg blue a standard color for this year and if so, what was the name of this shade of blue.

You may be able to see traces of the original color under the door cards. For a proper full restoration that's probably the only place that it would survive. Likewise you can take a chip of paint from a hidden interior area. Look under a microscope. Need a bit of luck though.

G'day Bluerunabout,
to PackardInfo.

I invite you to include your '23 Runabout in PackardInfo's Packard Vehicle Registry.

Take some pictures and post them of the current color and any "under/behind" the door jambs, under the sill plates, etc and people can see what you have...then we can direct you to color chip card samples from that era.

With Packard, being the premier luxury brand of its day, unlike Henry Ford...you could pay for any color you wanted including Black...although there was a standard color palette and groups (see parts books for factory standard exterior, trim/stripe and interior/fabric default groups unless customer ordered).

Some photos would be a good starting point.

Thanks, DM

The original paint colors for the 1922-23 Packard Single Six cars are contained in the dealers facts book, issued by Packard. A copy can be viewed on this site.

Open the "Literature Archive" on the LHS of of the screen, click on "Sales and Dealer Info..." ,click on "Data Books", scroll down to "1922-23 Single Six 126-133...."
Page 24 gives the colors of the various parts of the cars. The body and wheels of the open cars were painted Town Car Blue medium striped with gold. The fenders were black. Brightwork was nickel, (chrome plating was not used on Packards until 1929.)

New owners could choose to have their cars painted other colors but this would not have happened often and probably only on the top of the range cars.

I just figured out how to post pictures here. Please check out this blue shade on our 1923 Single Six Runabout and let me know if you've seen this shade of blue before.

I just posted a photo of our car. Have you seen this shade of blue before?

Nice car but I doubt that it is an original color, the cars of that era tended to be painted much darker colors. The pigments for such a color may not have been available then.
I owned a 1922 Single Six for nearly 50 years and sold it recently. Great car, we took it on many long distance tours.