Ian Callum, one of Britain’s most celebrated car designers, tells us about his latest projects and the inspiration he draws from living on the Dorset coast
Words: Chris Pickering Photos: Rich Pearce
There’s a stunning clarity to the waters of Poole Harbour. It’s high tide, and waves are gently lapping against the sea wall below as British design legend Ian Callum CBE looks across the sparkling waters.
‘Whenever ex-pats tell me they’ve found somewhere better than the UK, I wonder if they’ve ever really explored the Dorset coast,’ he remarks, gazing across possibly one of the most beautiful natural harbours in the world.
The 68-year-old Scot, awarded a CBE in 2019 for services to the British car industry, is one of UK’s most celebrated car designers, best known for penning iconic shapes like the Aston Martin DB7 and the Jaguar F-Type. His career has taken him all over the world, but it’s this sun-drenched corner of South West England that’s kept calling him back, ever since he first visited here 30 years ago.
‘I remember walking down to the Sandbanks peninsula by the Jazz Café,’ he recalls. ‘Back then it was just a sandy road with a few camper vans parked up. We walked past them and lo and behold there was this beautiful golden beach. I just fell in love with it. I thought, “one day I’d love to live here”.’ 
Around five years ago, Ian had the opportunity to finally build his dream home in nearby Canford Cliffs after a plot with a derelict bungalow came up for sale. We head back there after the photoshoot in Poole Harbour. The exterior of the new build is eye-catching and starkly modernist – a somewhat unexpected contrast to the flowing, classically elegant lines that characterise Ian’s automotive designs.
‘What I'm looking for in a piece is timeless design. I try to avoid visual complexity, and I suppose that’s maybe reflected in the place that I live,’ he comments, as we step across the threshold. ‘You should be able to take it all in with one eyeful, whether it’s a car or a building.’
The interior of the house is similarly minimalist. Clean, angular design, with sparse but comfortable furnishings. And yet it’s far from clinical. The walls are dotted with bold and colourful prints and paintings, ranging from American hot rods to David Bowie as Ziggy Stardust. Between the books, on rock and roll and automotive design, sit models of some of the many cars he has been involved in over the years. It reflects a lifetime of creativity, of iconic designs distilled into a neat, orderly display of model cars.
‘I've got a bit of a saying, which is “order out of chaos”. You often have to create chaos to be creative,’ he says. ‘So, I do work in a chaotic world – at least in the initial stages, in my head. But at the end of the day, I want to feel a sense of order. And I find a simple house like this is very much part of that.’
Bespoke projects
Perching on the sofa, as I settle down to interview Ian, it’s hard not to be distracted by what lurks off to the side. A glass door and a full-length window separate the living room from the garage, where one of Ian’s most famous car designs is proudly on display – an Aston Martin Vanquish, as driven by James Bond in the 2002 film Die Another Day. Except this is no ordinary Vanquish. Gleaming candy apple red, it’s one of a small batch of cars that his design company CALLUM has taken and thoroughly re-imagined. It truly embodies the company’s mission to ‘create design stories that stir the imagination’. But, as Ian recounts, the project began more or less by accident.
‘I realised that I’d never actually owned a car that I’d designed, so I went out and bought a Vanquish. I looked at it, and like every car I’ve got, I wasn’t happy with it. I tend to change things – I just can’t help myself,’ he admits.
What started off as an evening project to re-model his own car, quickly spiralled into a business venture when he retired from his role as head of design at Jaguar. CALLUM has now embarked on a limited run of 25 customer cars. Each starts with an existing Vanquish, which is treated to a complete nut-and-bolt rebuild, incorporating more than 350 changes to the styling, the materials and the engineering. It’s a thorough conversion, which blends the analogue character of the original Vanquish with sharper handling, increased performance and a bespoke finish.
‘Every car is unique. We work with each of the customers to design the car to their own specifications,’ he explains. ‘That in itself is a fascinating process. Our customers are an eclectic mix, ranging from East End fashion designers to people from wealthy backgrounds in the Middle East.’
After graduating from the Royal College of Art, with a master's in Vehicle Design, Ian joined Ford in 1979, and spent the next four decades in the car industry. During this time, he worked on everything from the Ford RS200 rally car to the all-electric Jaguar I-PACE SUV. But after 40 years of working for large companies, Ian was keen to try something new.
Waves and whisky
‘Moving to Dorset was partly about getting away from that corporate world,’ he comments. ‘I wanted to get involved in a much more eclectic range of products.’
The Vanquish 25 was to be the first of these, but it has since opened the floodgates. One of his next projects was a lounge chair inspired by the iconic Eames Chair of the 1950s (‘every designer has to do a chair at some point,’ he quips).
Other projects include an electric scooter for Abu Dhabi start-up Barq, a home racing simulator for motorsport firm Prodrive and even a CALLUM-branded whisky in collaboration with the Annandale Distillery, near Ian’s hometown of Dumfries.
‘I bumped into an old school friend, David Thomson, who owns a successful company in the food and drinks industry. He had invested some of that money into rebuilding an old distillery,’ Ian recalls. ‘I was very impressed with what he’d done. So, David invited me to pick out a cask to bottle as a CALLUM whisky. My favourite was cask number 529, so that’s how we ended up with CALLUM 529 by Annandale.’
The unique designs for the bespoke ceramic bottle in Callum Blue (a shade of dark blue that is Ian’s signature colour) and the packaging for this limited-edition single malt whisky began – as do most of the CALLUM projects – on Ian’s drawing board in his home office in Dorset. This not only provides an uncluttered space to focus within the house, but it also allows him to draw inspiration from the surrounding area.
‘I always feel very calm and collected here, and I find it inspiring. You can't constantly focus on one thing for more than two or three hours. You have to get up and walk somewhere, clear your head, and for me that’s often down to the beach,’ he comments. ‘I grew up near the sea, and it’s something that keeps calling you back.’
It’s often the pristine golden expanse of Sandbanks beach that provides this inspiration. Though nearby Swanage, Studland Bay and Weymouth are also favourites. And on a gloriously bright, sunny day such as today it’s easy to see why Ian has fallen in love with Dorset, and why he finds this such an inspirational location.
See more of Ian’s creations at callumdesigns.com
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Ian’s Dorset Road Trips
Ian’s passion for cars isn’t confined to his professional life. Away from work, his current fleet includes a 1932 Ford Model B hot rod, a 1979 Volkswagen Beetle 1303 Cabriolet and a 1995 Porsche 993. He also enjoys cycling around the lanes of Dorset.
‘The Porsche 993 is my go-to car if I want to go for a proper drive, I love taking that down to Weymouth,’ he comments. ‘The run from Poole, through Wareham and Corfe Castle to Swanage is another favourite drive, I do it quite regularly just for the sake of it, rather than going across the water via the chain ferry.’
When it comes to two wheels, however, he recommends taking the ferry from Poole and then following the coastal road past Studland to Swanage: ‘It’s got quite a lot of hills – on a bike you notice gradients that you never appreciate in the car, but there are some great pubs when you get there.’
Ian’s favourite Dorset walks
Dorset’s blend of dramatic coastal scenery and idyllic countryside combined with its vibrant seaside towns and buzzing café culture provide plenty for Ian to explore on foot or by car.
‘Canford Cliffs beach can be a bit quieter than Sandbanks, so that’s often a nice place to walk,’ he says. ‘The Cliff pub is a good place for a glass of wine, and further down towards Branksome Chine and Bournemouth there are some nice cafes on the beach. I quite often find a quiet table to sketch out some ideas. Branksome’s got some very impressive buildings. I enjoy the architecture around there too – it’s not all to my taste, but it’s interesting to see the different styles and finishes that people have used. Westbourne, slightly further inland between Poole and Bournemouth, has a good café culture that extends well into the evening,’ he notes.
Ian is a big fan of the Jurassic Coast, a UNESCO Natural World Heritage site running from Orcombe Point in East Devon to Old Harry Rocks near Swanage: ‘I love driving over to Lyme Regis, walking along the beach there is very pleasant. In high season, if you stick to the Seaton side of the Jurassic Coast, over in East Devon, it’s bit less manic.’
