Why We Close Registration a Month Early

Five hundred cars, finite streets, and the planning that makes it work.

Artomobilia registration is closing. We're down to the last few cars in the main show, and while there's still some room in the Porsche, BMW, Mercedes, and Lotus corrals, those are filling too. When we reach capacity, we're full. That's not a sales tactic. It's math.

A question we get all the time: why close registration so early?

The answer is simple. We park more than five hundred cars on the streets of the Carmel Arts & Design District and Midtown. The space is generous, but it's finite, and staging that many vehicles so everyone has a good experience takes real work. Closing a month out gives us the two weeks we need to organize cars, sponsors, partners, and merchants into a footprint that only works if it's planned carefully.

Here's what happens next, so you know what to watch for.

Acceptance emails go out during the first week of August, once we've confirmed which group each car belongs to. Load-in instructions follow in the second week, after every car has a location in the district. Those instructions will tell you exactly where to arrive, whether that's the marshaling yard or somewhere else, and what time to be there.

Load-in runs between 8:00 and 10:45am. That's a lot of cars to move in a short window, which is why we stagger arrivals rather than opening the gates and hoping for the best. The result is a calm morning instead of a chaotic one.

So take a few minutes this weekend and run through registration. It's quick. Then watch your inbox for acceptance during the first week of August and load-in instructions late in the second.

There's still room. There won't be for long.