Six Star Magazine Six Star Magazine Spring/Summer 2019 | Page 14

M
ost of us can understand an
overwhelming passion for
the Subaru brand. But for British
TV presenter and car collector Paul
Cowland, this passion has become an
obsession—and has given rise to one
of most striking collections of six-
starred machines in existence.
When you’ve spent your entire life in the automotive
industry, it’s easy to become obsessed by cars, but for some
enthusiasts, it starts even earlier than that. “Cars have been
a true passion of mine since birth!” Paul Cowland laughs.
“Looking back at my baby pictures, I’m
holding a toy car in every one. There was
only ever one industry I could have ever
gone into, really.”
These days, he advises many leading
automotive brands on their PR and
marketing from his home base in the UK.
But he’s much more widely known as one of
the stars of the hit TV show Salvage Hunters:
Classic Cars, which airs around the world on
the Discovery Network.
Prior to this though, Paul spent many
years on the showroom floor, as a salesman,
sales manager and dealer principal. Starting
out with Swedish carmaker Saab, he had
something of an epiphany in the 1990s
when his dealership group took on the Subaru franchise. “I’d
had a huge amount of experience with turbocharged cars with
Saab,” he explains. “But that first test drive in an Impreza
Turbo was a literal game-changer! I’d never sat in anything at
12 six star magazine
any price point that drove, rode and handled like that car did.
I knew then that I wanted to sell those instead!”
Fast forward to the present day and Paul’s journey
carried him from the franchised world of the main Subaru
dealership—by way of a successful tuning
and rally preparation career with Impreza
and WRX models—through to the present
day, where he still works closely with
Subaru UK on special projects. “They’re
such a fantastic and enthusiastic bunch
to work with,” he explains. “The entire
business is staffed with real petrolheads
who really understand what the brand’s
about. We’ve had some real fun over the
years, particularly with some of our track-
based projects.”
During that intervening time, Paul’s
passion for the Subaru brand and for car
collecting has meant that several nice
examples have come his way. Thanks to
having an understanding wife and plenty of storage space, he’s
managed to amass quite the collection, covering some of the
more left-field hits from the eclectic Subaru back catalogue.
It’s hard to know where to start, really, isn’t it?