From the archive
6 February 1935
TRUST Selochrome to see folk as they really are: a strange shade of bluish brown, in the case of the salty sea dog on the, one of several different titles that AP used in its early days as it consumed or merged with rivals and added their name to its own. This week the Editor, FJ Mortimer, reported on a speech made by Lord Iliffe at a dinner of the Institute of British Carriage Manufacturers. ‘To my mind,’ he said, ‘a really beautiful motor car is just as much a work of art as a picture or a piece of sculpture.’ As Mortimer reported: ‘He appealed to the carriage building industry to be awake to their responsibilities in this matter, pointing out that what they designed today the mass-producer would turn out tomorrow, whether in the way of beauty or of ugliness and eccentricity.’ Why did this matter to Mortimer? Well because ‘now that no road is ever seen without a motor car… it certainly will be an achievement if the design of cars becomes such that we can include one in a landscape composition without any aesthetic discomfort or disturbance.’ One can only imagine what Mortimer would have thought about the rise of the ubiquitous white transit van. Bargain hunters were spoiled for choice with many retailers still in January sale mode. Westminster Photographic Exchange were offering a new Rolleicord for £12: 15s (£920 today) or the Leica Model III for £35: 5s (£2,540) with a collapsible F/2 Summar.
