Recently I took the chance to look back through over a year of entries in this blog, it was a most pleasant experience and I recommend you do the same when you have a spare hour or two (or three).  One thing I noticed was that we are very global in our focus, cars and events have been featured from all over the world.  Considering we are a blog based in Britain I thought it time to highlight some cars a bit more local, so as we stated yesterday this week is going to be considered 'British Week'.

One of the most telling things about looking outside of your local area for inspiration is that everyone is at it.  Japanese people influenced by US hot rod culture, US guys building JDM style cars, Scandinavians building Pro-Touring style domestic models, Russians building Californian look cars.  What is it about the exotic that tempts us more than what is right round the corner?  The first thought is that the more local cars and scenes are so ubiquitous in our world that they just become the background in which we spend our time.  The third or fourth time you've seen the same car in a couple of months of show season it becomes a bit more ordinary.  We become a little jaded by familiarity, I’m sure there is a pithy phrase we could use for this, but I don’t think it is accurate to say “familiarity breeds contempt” in this instance, more a level of normalness.

What we're doing is taking our local scene for granted.  Local doesn't just mean within a ten mile radius, but out countries 'local' scene.  If you look around the web for particular countries you'll get presented with the best of what that country has to offer usually.  If there are thousands of modified cars in a country and only the thirty or so best cars are often seen on the net, you'll be left with the impression that those thirty cars represent everything from that country, which is probably not entirely accurate.  In the UK we tend to laud particular builders quite a bit, deservedly so, people like the Beardmore Bros., Andy Saunders and Dave Rothwell have made it into our pages before.  There are however literally hundreds of great UK builders working in everything from plush workshops to sheds, or even out on the street.  They are your local heroes, there to inspire, help and inform the rest of us striving for our own bit of this whole thing.

So next time you fancy heading off to Minkara Car View, or Garaget, take some time to browse some UK forums like Retro Rides Readers Rides, Turbo Sport or Rods and Sods for starters.  It is also always worth checking out what Burnham autos are up to on their monthly news updates.  We’ve got a lot to be proud of in the UK, we’ve turned out some world beating modified cars, it would be great if we can produce even more.