In the late 80’s I started helping out at the legendary garage of Dan Margulies in South Kensington. Dan’s passion for Italian cars, particularly Maserati and Lancia, with the occasional Ferrari and Alfa for good measure, is well known and with his racing experience he dictated that the cars drive as they were designed too and not just look pretty.
Much of the beauty in his cars was in the engineering. Who couldn’t be enthused by a 1948 Maserati’s 4CLT engine with twin superchargers and 16 valves all wrapped up in fabulous magnesium, aluminium and bronze castings.
When, after over 40 years, Dan closed his doors and retired I moved with two of his employees, Edward Wodehouse and Patrick Blakeney-Edwards, to their new business next to the Alfa 8C guru, Paul Grist. With many cars from Dan’s workshop, Patrick’s VSCC Frazer Nash chain gang connections and Paul’s ‘blue chip’ cars there was never a dull moment. The commute from South London to Hertfordshire in ’74 GT Junior that I’d picked up in South Africa with hard tyres and soft bushes made every trip enjoyable and an expert in opposite lock cornering.
But even three hours thrashing and old Alfa through London every day wore thin so when an old workshop came up in Peckham the move to starting my own place seemed the best thing to do and with 105 series Alfas under my skin it wasn’t hard to choose which cars to concentrate on.
Slowly and steadily business grew and out-grew South London, a relocation to Suffolk and the opening of Victory Garage brought us to where we are today. The majority of the work is restoration and track preparation but no job is too small. Often a car can transformed by a quick tune up!
Take a stroll through the site and see projects past and present. If you’ve an Alfa needing work or you’re thinking about buying one and want to know what to look for drop me a line or telephone the workshop.
