Coachbuilt Legacy

Meeting the committed few still flying the flag for Harrington, the coachbuilder that created distinctive bodies for buses and made classy coupés out of British roadsters

- CHARLIE CALDERWOOD

If you are not into Sunbeam Alpines or mid-century coaches, you probably haven't heard of Harrington, but the long-defunct Hove-based company is still beloved by those in the know for producing beautiful bodywork for whatever its artisans found themselves working on. The Harrington Gathering brings together the company's disparate products every five years, and in May 2023 it came to Transport Museum Wythall.

Thomas Harrington & Sons followed the welltrodden route of early 20th-century coachbuilders as it moved from building horse-drawn carriages to bodywork for motorised chassis, specialising in commercial vehicles. The firm moved to an Art Deco-fronted factory in Hove in 1930, and that style would dominate its automotive creations. Among its most famous coaches are its dorsal-finned streamliners, although all of its bodies display a similar style. "It carried this design theme on through the 1940s, '50s and '60s, to the last vehicles it made," says Denis Chick, trustee at the museum in Worcestershire. "There is the same design flair all the way through. They are glorious machines."

Looking to diversify its income, particularly with something that didn't take quite as long to build as an entire coach, Harrington turned back towards cars as a sideline in 1961. Two different Sunbeam Alpine-based models are its most famous products, but the firm also produced closed-cockpit Triumph TR4s. It wasn't enough to save the company, however. The firm closed in 1966, and its decadent factory building has long since disappeared.

Fraser Clayton 1939 LEYLAND CHEETAH HARRINGTON