Rover: A History in Cars

IT IS not a case of if, but when Land Rover will build its smallest off-roader. The LRX Concept was shown at the Melbourne Motor Show last month and Land Rover flew in its chief designer Julian Thomson for the presentation. He said the four-seater LRX “cross coupe” would go into production in three to four years and would look very similar to the show car. The LRX is smaller than a Freelander and features a rising waistline, no B pillar, a space-age interior with LED lights in the carpet which is made from recycled drink bottles, and it is powered by a hybrid electric/bio-diesel powerplant. “The exterior is close to what we will have in production – the mirrors will have to be bigger – but much of it will go into production,” Thomson said. “Car design is really […]

Set to celebrate its 90th birthday annivarsary, The MG Car Company was founded in 1924 and got its name from Morris Garages, a dealer of Morris cars in Oxford which began producing its own customised versions to the designs of Cecil Kimber. The first cars, re-bodied Morris models, used coachwork from Carbodies of Coventry and were built in premises in Alfred Lane, Oxford. On May 1, 1924, the Octagon was registered as an MG trademark. The marque has come a long way since those early days, with the famous octagonal emblem recognised and celebrated around the globe. After several moves in Oxford, due to a growing demand for more cars to be produced, the MG moved to Abingdon and ever since the town has been the home of the MG. Arguably Britain’s favourite classic sports car reaches its 90th anniversary […]

You may think of the French as producing the most strikingly streamlined cars of the 1930s, in lyric teardrop bodies hammered out with doses of Italian style and German science. But in his book “Art Deco and British Car Design: The Airline Cars of the 1930s“, Barrie Down reminds us that streamline design was the rage among car buffs everywhere in the ’30s, even in upright, country-house, Evelyn Waugh Britain. Mr. Down reminds us that at the same time streamline cars were going on the market, ocean liners and trains were being streamlined, the better to compete with the nascent airline industry. His book also reminds us that the automobile industry of the time in Britain had yet to embrace mass production. Cars were sold to the few, and the sellers were coachbuilders as much as chassis or engine makers. […]