Baybe Bloomer


Late Bays are rather looked down upon by some, but the Melliard’s retro kitsch custom is causing people to look up, in more ways than one


 


Who’d have thought, five years ago, that Bay Window Buses would be changing hands for upwards of 10 grand? Or that there would be a Split in the Bay Window community between ‘Early’ and ‘Late’ Bays? But it only takes one person to do something and it can change the way people think. 


Neil and Mandy Melliard – the duo behind the ace lettering / signwriting / pinstriping / custom paintshop Prosign in South London, have a bit of a reputation. No one that has ever met either of them has anything but good things to say about them, and, well, let’s just say you don’t get asked to paint Formula 1 cars or show-winning dragsters, hot rods, custom cars and motorcycles all over the world unless you’re pretty damn good at what you do.


Having gone as far as they could with their previous Split Bus, the pair decided they wanted something a bit more down to earth. “Everybody thinks you have to have a Split to be cool, preferably a Barndoor, so we set out to prove you could do something cool with something different.” says Mandy. They found a Merino Yellow ’79 Bay Window Minibus  advertised on the Samba. We’ll keep what is an incredible story simple and just say it came from a collector in the Austrian Alps with 60,000kms on the clock and its fair share of dents and dings. However, in all the important places, it was still factory orange paint and absolutely rust free and the interior was so good the rear seats are currently wrapped up and in storage. “The more I got into it, the better it got,” Neil says with a smile. “The engine hadn’t even had the plugs changed in 15 years, yet it ran sweet as a nut.”


In fact, it was so good it fitted the remit for what they wanted perfectly, just as it was. But being the Melliards, they couldn’t leave well alone. “I’d have left it as it was, maybe put some thin-band whitewalls on it,” says Neil. “But I wanted to lower it and put a camping interior in it,” interjects Mandy. It’s not hard to see who got their own way.


Wanting to be absolutely sure everything mechanical was right before he entrusted his family’s lives to the old girl, Neil went through all the brakes, replaced all the fuel and brake lines, put in a new clutch and had the Bus rewired, before letting those good ol’ boys, the Type 2 Detectives, loose on the suspension.


“I wanted a camping interior that looked like it might have been fitted originally,” Mandy explains of the next stage in the Bus’ transformation. Having looked around at what was available, they settled on Custom Made Furniture Ltd [see www.busfurniture.co.uk]. Again, being the Melliards, they couldn’t leave it in bare marine ply, so stained and lacquered it themselves and sourced a sheet of genuine ’70’s-style Formica to cover the table and all the work areas. 


What really sets off the interior though is the black basket weave vinyl seat coverings, courtesy of Bernard Newbury Coachtrimmers. It’s about the least exciting interior material VW ever used yet couldn’t be more perfect for this Bus, matching the original front seat as closely as possible and underlining the period timeline the guys have gone for.


By now, the Bus was starting to look better underneath and on the inside than it was on the outside, which brings us to the paintwork, and inevitably, to the roof. 


The Bus received a going over from Phil Norman at Brickfield Autos. Like everything else on this Bus, it was only supposed to be a quick tidy up, but, well, you know how it goes. “Phil called up part-way through and said it was going to be just as easy to paint it from the gutters down, so in the end it got a very thorough paintjob,” explains Neil. All except the roof, that is... “People ask us why we put so much effort into painting the roofs of our Buses,” says Mandy. “It’s because you don’t want to drive round with that in your face all the time, plus it’s less likely to get damaged up there. I did the first designs on the computer, just messing about, but then started looking at ’70’s wallpapers, posters by Israeli artist Emek and ’60’s London fashion label Biba.” The result is a multicoloured,  collision of flowers, shapes, stripes, pearls and Kandys, all tethered by the Melliard’s formidable grasp of colour palettes. 


“We’re not under any illusion,” says Neil in conclusion, “this isn’t a show car. It’s undersealed underneath, has Waxoyl everywhere and is a genuine daily driver. The paintwork on the roof is a good calling card for our business, of course, but we really just did it to try and make people think differently about later Buses. The next one we do will be a show car...” 


 

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