Born in Glasgow and now resident in Canada, Iain Ayre is both opinionated and unfocused, and was warmly encouraged by his school to leave. After several random gap year jobs he decided to take an English and art teaching degree, but as teaching is hard work, he became a model portfolio photographer, cartoonist, advertising copywriter, copy chief and creative director, ending up as a writer at J. Walter Thompson in Mayfair. Unwisely, he launched an ad agency, and when that ended in tears, ambled into motoring journalism, writing for Triumph World , Classic Cars , MG Enthusiast , Kitcar , Japanese Performance , Redline , Jaguar World and Australian and US titles. He launch-edited Classic Ford , and wrote fourteen books about cars and one about gourmet dog food. In his spare time, he creates the occasional car: a Mini based three-wheeler, spaceframed XK120 replicas, a propane turbo V8 Cobra, and currently an Art-Deco-inspired Rolls-Royce boat-tailed two-seat speedster in aluminium.