Lights, Cameras, Aston!
Older Aston Martins often have a tale to tell. They tend to have lived interesting lives and been owned by colourful characters, but rarely can an Aston have lived quite such a rollercoaster existence as chassis DB5/2266/L.
In its six decades, it has passed through the hands of an international adventurer, a NASA scientist and a salt-flat racer, among others. It has survived engine transplants and fire. And it is now in the custody of award-winning TV director Hamish Hamilton, who has spent several years piecing together its remarkable story.
In-between directing assignments and lockdowns, Hamilton, 55, welcomes me warmly into his North London home. Six foot five, with a rock-star shock of hair and enough energy to light up a small town, he speaks with passion and infectious enthusiasm, his accent caught somewhere mid-Atlantic – as befits someone with homes on both sides of the Pond – but with clear traces of his Lancashire roots.
I’d be perfectly content to spend the next couple of hours hearing about the stars he’s worked with – everyone from Beyoncé to the Rolling Stones – and the Super Bowl half-time shows whose TV coverage he’s directed every year since 2010. But we’re here to talk about Astons – he’s had several – and in particular the storied DB5 that he stumbled across quite by accident and whose restoration was recently completed. Unpicking the history of the car became something of a mission. ‘I even hired a private investigator at one point,’ he laughs. ‘Crazy, huh?’
HIS LOVE OF MACHINERY can
