Artomobilia at 19: Nearly 500 Cars, a Mile of Carmel, and the Guy Who Built It
Published August 30, 2026
If you were anywhere near Main Street or the Monon yesterday, you already know. Artomobilia turned a mile of Carmel into an open-air gallery on Saturday with nearly 500 cars parked along the Arts & Design District and up Monon Boulevard through Midtown, no ropes, no velvet, no security guard telling you to back up. Just cars, sunlight, and about 25,000 people wandering between them.
It is, for my money, the best Saturday Carmel puts on all year. And what makes it work isn't the cars — it's the framing. Artomobilia has always insisted these machines are design objects, not just fast toys, and once you accept that you start looking at a fender the way you'd look at a sculpture. Which is exactly why it belongs in the Arts & Design District.
From a Formula 1 Casualty to a Carmel Institution
The origin story is better than it has any right to be. Artomobilia started in Indianapolis in 2008 as a companion event to Formula 1, put together by Roger Brummett, Andrew Lee, and a Butler grad from Brownsburg named John Leonard. Then F1 left Indianapolis, and the event could have quietly died with it. Instead Leonard reorganized it and — after some conversations with then-Mayor Jim Brainard — moved it north to Carmel.
That gamble aged extraordinarily well. At its 10th anniversary in 2017, Artomobilia drew roughly 15,000 spectators and 400 vehicles across more than 26 classes. Today it's closer to 25,000 people and pushing 500 cars.
Leonard is still the founder and executive director, and here's the part I love: it's not his job. He works at TRIMEDX and has raised three kids in Carmel with his wife. Artomobilia is his passion project — he's compared it to the way other people play golf. He calls himself "a conduit to the automotive community," which undersells it considerably, and he's quick to note that Artomobilia is the number-one revenue day of the year for basically every restaurant in the district.
Midtown Got Its Own Show
Worth calling out for anyone who stayed south of Main: Midtown is now a full venue, not an overflow lot. Two of the four marque celebrations set up at 365 Monon Boulevard — Lotus-Palooza, built around Colin Chapman's whole religion of going faster by weighing less, and BMW-Palooza, running from classic sport sedans and coupes straight through modern M cars and EVs.
Up in the Arts & Design District, Präzision-Palooza covered 75-plus years of Porsche with everything from early 356s to modern supercars, and Mercedes-Palooza ran heritage roadsters alongside current performance cars.
But the reason to walk the whole mile is that it never turns into an exotics-only flex. A six-figure Italian sits fifty feet from a Corvette somebody's driven for thirty years, and a VW bus draws just as big a crowd as anything with a prancing horse on it. That range is the whole personality of the event.
The Weekend Around the Weekend
Saturday is the headline, but it's the tip of it. Friday brought the Porsche Classic Restoration Challenge at Motor District in Westfield, where 24 restored cars went head to head, and the VELOCE Hangar Party at Indy Executive Airport in Zionsville — fifty performance cars parked among private aircraft, a Ruth's Chris menu, and the BlueWater Kings playing. Saturday added the Artistry & Elegance Ladies' Luncheon at Matador on Main, benefiting St. Mary's Early Childhood Center.
All of it ran alongside Carmel on Canvas, the plein air competition that puts three dozen-plus painters on the same streets working in real time. Painters and paint jobs, same square mile. Somebody planned that well.
Entering a car takes registration and a fee. Standing on the sidewalk looking at 500 of them does not.
Thank you to everyone who spent a year of Saturdays making yesterday happen. Carmel's lucky to have it.
Sources: Artomobilia, Carmel Monthly Magazine, Visit Hamilton County, Carmel Arts & Design District, and Current Publishing.
