We spoke with three apprentices from the Heritage Skills Academy who’ll be responsible for keeping classic and vintage cars on the road for years to come
Britain’s ritain’s classic car industry has an ageing population of specialist restorers and maintenance experts – but the Heritage Skills Academy (HSA) was founded in 2018 to address the gap these experts would otherwise leave.
Development director, Owain Johns, says: ‘There’s a danger that there will be a massive skills gap or the knowledge could just be lost entirely if we’re not here.’
Around 175 apprentices are enrolled on HSA courses, 60 of whom are working as coachbuilding apprentices based at
Brooklands Museum and 115 mechanical apprentices are located at Bicester Heritage. The three-year programmes are structured around block release learning; a week is spent with the HSA, then the next five to six weeks with an employer, allowing them to put their skills into practice in a real working environment.
So far, 34 apprentices have graduated from the course and landed full time jobs, often with the companies that they worked with during their apprenticeships. The scheme has around a 90:10 percent split of men and women and has apprentices of all ages and stages of life. The programme sustained during the pandemic and saw an uplift in applications afterwards so the team hopes to have 200 apprentices enrolled at any one time. In the coming years the HSA plans to expand its offerings to include trim and specialist engine-building courses.
Here’s what three of its current and former apprentices told us about their love of classics – and how it’ll help to keep your car on the road in years to come…
JOSEPH COOPER
‘My dad had a red Saab 900 convertible, which I thought was really cool and my grandad had motorbikes and a cabinet full of vintage cars like Bentley Blowers and Alfa Romeos that always interested me. My grandad bought me a mower to repair when I was about eight years old; I’m not sure I ever got it working but it was a start.
‘My old neighbour, who runs the garage where I work now, always had classic and vintage cars on his driveway, which piqued my interest in pre-war cars. He gifted me an Austin A30 to re-build when I was 12 years old, which certainly encouraged me to learn about how to restore and preserve classic cars. We went to the London Classic Car Show and were approached by the Heritage Skills Academy who suggested that I apply to its apprenticeship scheme to enhance my skills. I knew I was going to go full-time at Phoenix Green after college anyway, but this seemed like a great opportunity to support my learnin
