Some people collect car mascots, others badges, but Marc Veenhuis is the first we have met who has plas-tered his house with all manner of emblems, nameplates and orna¬ments from an antique Kaiser badge to the 318i from the back of a BMW. Veenhuis’s obsession started three years ago when he became registered disabled with arthritis. In the short time since, he has amassed almost 3500 badges, insignia and emblems from 208 different marques. 

Two cabinets (one of hood ornaments and another of models and odds and ends) downstairs in his unassuming home at Velswijk near Arnhem, Holland barely hint at what lies upstairs. On the first floor, a study wall is festooned with the older and rarer items in Veen¬huis’s collection. Among them are his favourites from Kaiser and Frazer. He says: “As well as being-very difficult to find, they are elegant and stately.