Sports & Specialist
AC
One of Britain's oldest car makers, AC began in West Norwood, London, in 1901 and moved to Thames Ditton, Surrey, in 1911. It is best known for the…
Allard
Sydney Allard built big-engined trials and sports cars in Clapham, south London, from 1945. His J2 finished third at Le Mans in 1950 and was raced by Carroll…
Alvis
T. G. John founded Alvis in Coventry in 1919, and its 12/50 and Speed 20 made it one of Britain's most respected makers of quality sporting cars. Car…
Arash
Arash Motor Company of Newmarket, Suffolk, founded by Arash Farboud in 1999, builds supercars in tiny numbers, including the AF8 and the hybrid AF10 hypercar. Its earlier Farboud…
Ariel
Simon Saunders set up the company in 1991 to build the Atom, a lightweight exoskeleton sports car that began as a Coventry University student project. Based in Crewkerne,…
Aston Martin
Founded in London in 1913 by Lionel Martin and Robert Bamford, Aston Martin grew from a small maker of sporting light cars into Britain's best-known builder of luxury…
Atalanta
Atalanta Motors of Staines built about 20 advanced, expensive sports cars between 1937 and 1939, with tubular chassis, all-round independent suspension and a choice of twin-cam four or…
Austin-Healey
Austin-Healey was born at the 1952 Motor Show, when Austin's Leonard Lord saw Donald Healey's Healey Hundred and agreed to build it as the Austin-Healey 100. The big…
BAC
Brothers Neill and Ian Briggs founded Briggs Automotive Company in Liverpool in 2009 to build the Mono, a single-seat, road-legal supercar launched in 2011. Its Mono R of…
Bentley
W. O. Bentley founded Bentley Motors in Cricklewood, north London, in 1919, and his big sporting cars won Le Mans five times between 1924 and 1930. Owned by…
Berkeley
Caravan maker Charles Panter and designer Lawrie Bond created Berkeley in 1956 at Biggleswade, Bedfordshire, building small glass-fibre sports cars with motorcycle engines. About 4,100 were made, including…
Bond Cars
Bond built quirky three-wheeled Minicars in Preston, Lancashire, from 1949, followed by small sports cars, before Reliant took the company over in 1969. Its best-known model, the wedge-shaped…
Bristol
Bristol Cars began in 1945 as the car-making arm of the Bristol Aeroplane Company, building hand-made grand tourers to aircraft standards near Bristol. Famously private and selling from…
Brough Superior
George Brough, maker of the Brough Superior motorcycles dubbed "the Rolls-Royce of motorcycles", also built about 85 fast Brough Superior cars in Nottingham between 1935 and 1939, using…
Buckler Cars
Buckler chassis and running gear were used by amateur and semi-professional racers throughout the 1950s, and the former Crowthorne and Reading factory sites both carry blue plaques marking…
Caterham
Caterham Cars has built the Seven, the lightweight sports car it took over from Lotus in 1973, ever since. Founded by Graham Nearn, a Lotus dealer in Caterham,…
Clan
A group of former Lotus engineers led by Paul Haussauer founded Clan in 1969 at Washington, County Durham, to build the Crusader, a small glass-fibre monocoque sports car…
Costin
Frank Costin, the aircraft engineer who shaped the Vanwall and early Lotus racing cars and co-founded Marcos, built his own road car, the Costin Amigo, from 1970 to…
Davrian
Davrian was a tiny glass-fibre monocoque coupé designed by structural engineer Adrian Evans and built from 1965, first in Clapham and later in west Wales. Light and agile,…
Dax
Dax, founded by Derek Johns in 1968 as DJ Sportscars, was the first British company to make a kit replica of the AC Cobra 427. Its Dax 427,…
