One More Than 10 - Singer and the Porsche 911

Author: Michael Harley & Rob Dickinson, ISBN: 9780989114943, 276 pages, Hardback, Published in 2016

In the 1970s a boy was in the back-seat of his dad?s India Red VW Beetle hammering along a French autoroute outside Narbonne. He watched a new Porsche 911 close, pass and howl away. The 911 got under his skin.Much later, in the early 2000s he hot-rodded a 1969 Porsche 911E and found that many people liked what he?d done.

In 2008 there was a G-series Porsche 911 minus some of its bodywork, a rented corner of a workshop, some sketches and a vision to re-imagine the 911 utterly without compromise. To distill the elemental strands that made the car iconic, display a flagrant disregard for “good enough” and turn the dial on everything important up to eleven. Because in (almost) the words of This is Spinal Tap, “it’s one louder.” This was the beginning of Singer Vehicle Design.

In 2009 an orange 911 restored by Singer was shown at the Baja Cantina during Monterey Car Week. By 2013 cars had appeared on Top Gear, with Jay Leno and Chris Harris and in EVO Magazine.

By 2015 Singer was displaying it first Targa commission in the Cartier Style et Lux Concours d?Elegance at Goodwood Festival of Speed, on the lawn at Quail – A Motorsports Gathering in Carmel and at Salon Privee in the grounds of Blenheim Palace.

There was much more to it than this. There was a lot more swearing.

The full story, the complete cast of rogues, lunatics and geniuses and some of the swearing, can be found in this book, agonized over and finessed just like the cars.

It?s called One More Than 10 and it tells the story of Singer and the Porsche 911.

Synopsis

Some call them the best air-cooled Porsches ever, others the best cars in'the world. They are the Porsche 911 sports cars that have been restored, reimagined, and reborn by Singer Vehicle Design.

Each one begins with a 964 chassis that is stripped down and restored using bespoke carbon-fiber body panels, the finest in optimized mechanical and electrical components and top-quality materials and finishes. Every Singer-restored car is an incomparable work of impeccable craftsmanship. One More than 70: Singer and the Porsche 911

brings the reader as close to these beautiful machines as one can get, excepting the lucky few who own one.

Singer Vehicle Design is driven by the singular vision of Rob Dickinson, an erstwhile rock musician who came to be one of the world’s foremost distillers of the essence

of air-cooled Porsche. Journalist Michael Harley and Dickinson tell the story, while an all-star cast of automotive writers, journalists, and personalities offer their perspectives on the Singer phenomenon. Throughout the book some of the finest photographers in the automotive world, with unparalleled access to Singer’s shops and vehicles, reveal the sublime beauty of these Porsche 9118 as they are restored, and as they play at the track and run the open road.

The writers, photographers, and artists who were enlisted to contribute to this unique book include Guy Allen, Antonio Alvendia, Les Bidrawn, Tom Ford, Marino Franchitti, Robert Genat, Ken Gross, Chris Harris, Evan Klein, Jay Leno, Phil McGovern, Chad McQueen, Holly Martin, Richard "Dickie" Meaden, Tiff Needell, Drew Phillips, Matt Stone, Pete Stout, Peter Vincent, G.F. Williams, Renato Zacchia, and Jeff Zwart.