The future of paint and material at Morgan

Picture a Morgan – what colour is it? For decades, customers have flocked to traditional blues and greens, but times are changing and the Worcestershire firm’s latest hire wants to sharpen its approach. CMF designer Libby Carpenter runs a new speccing suite in its flagship Malvern dealer while pursuing new, inventive materials to supplement the classic woods and leathers a Morgan typically wears. 

“I studied textile design at University of the Arts and in my final year, I specialised in CMF,” Libby tells CDN. “They allowed me to branch out from my fellow students because they knew I was really into CMF and my work tended to focus on how colour appears — the illusion of colour and how it's subjective to its surroundings. That’s what my university projects were usually based upon.”

If Morgan’s next generation of models have a more avant-garde air to them, it’s Libby we can thank. “We’ve been thinking about how we can keep the heritage nature of our standard paint options but also modernise them and make them a bit more contemporary,” she continues. “The forms we use at Morgan really suit solids, so how do we take that idea and apply a more technical finish, one that bridges the gap between solids and metallics?”

No two Morgans leave the factory the same, though. Outside of its especially customisable limited-run cars, one in five of its regular production models roll out the door sporting bespoke ideas. Which is where Libby’s new suite of dreams steps in, containing every standard paint and material ready to be whipped into shape on a mood board for prospective owners whose ideas can’t be contained by configurators alone. Even if Morgan’s is surprisingly swish…

Paint to sample is increasingly popular, especially on those rarer special editions. “On Libby's first day we had a customer visit the factory who wanted a very particular red for his Midsummer,” says chief design officer Jon Wells, referring to the one-of-50 Pininfarina-penned speedster. “We couldn't find anything straight away, so Libby went to the paint booths and very nicely asked the painters if they could create something off the hip. I would never be able to get them to do that for me!

“By the time we'd walked back over to the visitor centre, sat down and had a coffee, a painter walked in with a metal paint sample still red hot from the oven. You've never seen a customer so delighted – he was experiencing a craftsman make something before our eyes. We can do that sort of thing almost instantaneously, but to get a new paint registered, processed and formalised can take up to a month.”

Libby’s role extends much deeper into the CMF journey, weaving new ideas into Morgans from the very beginning. Newer, lighter and more sustainable materials are one such area, her experience in material sciences rethinking how a Malvern sports car is trimmed. Bamboo leather, around two-thirds lighter than cow leather, sits among her current explorations.

“Morgan has always stuck to wood, aluminium and leather because they are the right materials for the job,” says Jon. “What Libby is introducing to us is that there are more materials on this planet that can be worked by hand and which are sustainable and lightweight. It's a very exciting opportunity to broaden our offering without taking away any of the material storytelling that is so important to what we do.”

But while larger, more mainstream carmakers syphon off development time and budget to the recyclability of their components, Morgans are built with a different, perhaps enviable angle on sustainability.

“Our whole factory runs on Weetabix,” quips Wells on the entirely hand-built nature of every Morgan. “It's a very low energy manufacturing process and the cars are kept for a long period of time. North of 80% of all Morgans ever built across our 116 years are still accounted for. Sustainability to us is more about the energy in sourcing a material, the energy in deploying it and then its longevity inside the product. We also make inherently very lightweight vehicles. Their powertrains aren't working very hard.”

Customer commissions and limited-run models are shaping Morgan’s future thanks to the design and engineering boundaries that low-volume manufacture helps push. The Midsummer began its development after the higher-volume Supersport yet informed the higher-volume car’s wing surfacing.

“Rarer, more intimate cars also come with a different expectation of customer journey,” adds Jon. “We are establishing a status quo where people will come to Morgan and ‘turn left’; they’ll come and have a direct experience with the design team. We're really reaping the benefits from that, establishing some great relationships and some great new customers.

“We are not chasing volume as a manufacturer. Our sweet spot is between 700 and 800 cars per year, largely because we want to nurture that very personal relationship with the customer.”

With Libby on board, it sounds like they have it nailed.