Ever since the creation of the very first MG back in the roaring twenties, the sporting marque has always been rightly associated with the outdoor sporting life, and in particular the passion of driving for sheer pleasure. That association with the English countryside even extended to the factory from which the majority of the cars rolled out from the end of that opening decade.
For fifty years, MG sports cars and saloons were mainly built in a factory on the outskirts of the quintessentially English country town of Abingdon-on-Thames. Being situated just a stone’s throw from the rolling hills and sweeping country roads of England seemed somehow appropriate for a car which demanded to be driven just as its designers intended – safely but fast and always entertaining.
Over the years, that driving essence of what made MG tick was never lost. Fast forward to the present day, and you might at first be forgiven for somehow imagining that a little of that past magic has been lost, and that the MG TF no longer has the alchemy of the English country road coursing through its veins. But thankfully you’d be wrong if you did, for it is a well-kept secret that the Longbridge factory is not crammed into a city centre but nestled on the edge of verdant rolling pastures, with the beautiful Lickey hills on the door step.
When the father of the Longbridge factory, Herbert – later Lord Austin – was hunting for a site for his new car factory at the tail end of 1905, he was looking for somewhere that was on the one hand not too far from the industrial heartland of Birmingham, with the city’s proud tradition of engineering, but on the other far enough away from the post-Victorian atmosphere of smog and dirt. The reason for this was simple: in those days, the hand-applied enamel paint on the coachwork of every new car took hours to dry, and Austin needed somewhere far away from what was then a polluted city centre to ensure that his cars ended up with perfect blemish-free paintwork.
Longbridge in those days was a small settlement about seven miles south of Birmingham, usefully served by the railway, and so Austin had the best of both worlds: clean smut-free country air and good transport links for his workforce.
Over the years, the suburbs of Birmingham grew and extended past the area of the Longbridge site, but thankfully those vast areas of open green parkland remain, just across the road from the factory itself. And so does much of the glorious networks of back roads, winding their way through villages like Barnt Green and Alvechurch, providing just as much an essential part of MG’s modern DNA as did the fondly remembered factory and Berkshire countryside of old. The Abingdon plant may be a fond memory, but Longbridge – the new home of MG – is still turning out driver’s sports cars with real heart. And the paint finish, by the way, is still flawless: Lord Austin would surely approve.
For fifty years, MG sports cars and saloons were mainly built in a factory on the outskirts of the quintessentially English country town of Abingdon-on-Thames. Being situated just a stone’s throw from the rolling hills and sweeping country roads of England seemed somehow appropriate for a car which demanded to be driven just as its designers intended – safely but fast and always entertaining.
Over the years, that driving essence of what made MG tick was never lost. Fast forward to the present day, and you might at first be forgiven for somehow imagining that a little of that past magic has been lost, and that the MG TF no longer has the alchemy of the English country road coursing through its veins. But thankfully you’d be wrong if you did, for it is a well-kept secret that the Longbridge factory is not crammed into a city centre but nestled on the edge of verdant rolling pastures, with the beautiful Lickey hills on the door step.
When the father of the Longbridge factory, Herbert – later Lord Austin – was hunting for a site for his new car factory at the tail end of 1905, he was looking for somewhere that was on the one hand not too far from the industrial heartland of Birmingham, with the city’s proud tradition of engineering, but on the other far enough away from the post-Victorian atmosphere of smog and dirt. The reason for this was simple: in those days, the hand-applied enamel paint on the coachwork of every new car took hours to dry, and Austin needed somewhere far away from what was then a polluted city centre to ensure that his cars ended up with perfect blemish-free paintwork.
Longbridge in those days was a small settlement about seven miles south of Birmingham, usefully served by the railway, and so Austin had the best of both worlds: clean smut-free country air and good transport links for his workforce.
Over the years, the suburbs of Birmingham grew and extended past the area of the Longbridge site, but thankfully those vast areas of open green parkland remain, just across the road from the factory itself. And so does much of the glorious networks of back roads, winding their way through villages like Barnt Green and Alvechurch, providing just as much an essential part of MG’s modern DNA as did the fondly remembered factory and Berkshire countryside of old. The Abingdon plant may be a fond memory, but Longbridge – the new home of MG – is still turning out driver’s sports cars with real heart. And the paint finish, by the way, is still flawless: Lord Austin would surely approve.
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