“Where on earth am I,” I muttered under my breath as I passed another uninspiring, grey, slab-sided industrial unit. The park I’m wandering around appears to be more suited to wholesalers than Italian master crafters like Ferrari, but it’s the home – so I’m told – of London’s foremost Ferrari fixing shop, led by HR Owen’s Technical Manager Atillio Romano.
Beyond the grey, a flash of Rosso Corsa red comes into view, in the far corner. A closer inspection reveals vintage and modern Ferrari’s, carefully arranged like a multi-million pound round of car Tetris. There’s even a rare Alfa Romeo 8C Competzione convertible surrounded by the sea of red. “Its owner hasn’t come to collect it for a while now,” says a voice behind me while I’m peering through the gaps in the fence.
Once through the glass sliding doors, it’s a world apart from the grey industrial estate. Beyond the large prancing horse mounted on the reception desk and, of course, the espresso machine, a freshly-painted shell of a vintage Ferrari 275, hovers above the shop floor on a hydraulic ramp. This is not your average garage.
Espresso in hand, I take a seat in the reception area, alongside owners, flicking through Ferrari magazines and brochures. Attilio, the man I’m here to meet, is busy tinkering under the bonnet, but it’s not long before he appears, oily rag in hand. A tall man sporting sunglasses and a leather jacket runs from the reception area to greet him at the door, crashes to his knees, bows his head and raises his hands in praise at Attilio’s feet. Attilio’s pleased to see him but looks slightly embarrassed. This is either an elaborate ploy to impress a journalist or he’s the Messiah of supercar tinkering.
“He’s a very good customer of ours and he’s here to pick up a couple of cars we’ve been working on,” Attilio says cooly while making his way over to an immaculate Ferrari Dino and 335 parked in the workshop. “The customers like to come down chat to me and about their cars – it’s different levels of engagement here,” says Attilio as he casually backs the Dino out of the workshop to return it to its enthusiastic owner.
He strolls back over to me, past a 599 GTO, a 458 Speciale, a couple of F12s and, oh yes, a trio of La Ferraris. Despite the fantastic feat of engineering these modern cars represent, it’s the older cars that Attillio’s interested in. He gravitates towards the gleaming 1964 Ferrari 275 shell on the ramp – and understandably so, it’s his pride and joy project car. “I’m restoring it back to its original spec,” he says as the car gently drops down from its lofty perch. “Not concourse spec, though, the owner actually wantsto use it,” he says. “The problem with classic car values these days is that people are reluctant to drive them for fear of devaluing them. Investors are driving the market this way, so it’s refreshing to see that some people still want to use them for what they were created for.” Attilio re-examines every seal and seam of the bodywork on the 275, pointing out details most gentleman drivers would overlook. “I prefer older cars – you can’t put enough into the new ones. The older ones are so much more involving.”
There’s a brand new La Ferrari directly behind us, charging up via the plug socket. It’s the antithesis of what we’ve just been admiring, with the only similarity between them being the prancing horse mounted on the nose. Attilio is frank about the new generation of supercars, especially the hybrid cars like the La Ferrari. “It’s dubious if cars like this one will still be around after I’m long gone,” he says. “It’s the electronics, you see – you can keep the old ones going by fabricating parts and replacing them, but the electronics makes them very complicated indeed.” Attilio’s well placed to make a judgment: after ten years working with Ferraris for H R Owen in the UK, he was offered a job working at the Ferrari HQ in Maranello, Italy in 2004. As family commitments grew, he moved back to the UK and became the UK’s only qualified technician for the mighty Bugatti Veyron in 2005. “It was only level one, just basic maintenance,” he says in a humble bid to play down the achievement. Today, he stands as one of only two technicians in London who are qualified to work on Ferrari’s hyper-hybrid: the La Ferrari.
Before I leave Attilio to get back to his work he shows me to his personal project car – a 1990s Lancia Thema, but it’s hardly your average Italian runabout. “I fitted an exhaust from a Ferrari 599, swapped the engine for a 16V turbo-charged unit and, to round it off, fitted a pair of Ferrari 430 Scuderia bucket seats… it causes quite a bit of confusion at the traffic lights,” he adds with a smile.
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All images by Drew Gibson.
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