Sir William Lyons founded Swallow Sidecars in 1923 to produce sidecars for motorcycles. By 1928, he had identified a need for a small, quality motorcar and created the Austin Swallow using the Austin 7 rolling chassis, engine, gearbox etc. combined with Swallow design and coachbuilding skills. The first prototype left the Blackpool factory for the Earls Court Motor Show in London in 1928. Budgetary restraints meant that the car could not be displayed inside the building so, parking outside the entrance proved the next best option. A fortuitous meeting with the well known Bentley dealer, Jack Barclay, on the pavement outside Earls Court resulted in an order for several hundred cars. The Austin Swallow was supplied in saloon, open 2-seater and coupe form (2-seater with hard top). The tiny cars had a high build quality with an Art Deco appearance, featuring vibrant, two-tone colour schemes not then common. When the Great Depression took its grip throughout the western world, these cute little cars with an affordable price tag found themselves accepted amongst the middle and upper classes as inexpensive, classy replacements for their earlier, more lavish vehicles. Production soared and in 1932, a larger saloon car - the Standard Swallow - was introduced together with the SS1 model. The original Austin 7 Swallow however, allowed Lyons to cut his teeth within the motor industry and go on to produce some true greats under the Jaguar name. With his keen eye for a design at a reasonable cost, models such as the SS100, the XK and the E-Type Jaguar were born.