The Austin A90 Atlantic is a British car produced by the Austin Motor Company from 1949 until 1952. It was launched initially as a four-seat convertible, making its début at the 1948 Earls Court Motor Show in London, with production models built between early 1949 and late 1950. A two-door coupé, marketed as the A90 Atlantic sports saloon, followed a year later. It had been previewed at the 1949 Motor Show and was in production at Longbridge between 1950 and 1952. Development The Atlantic was one of the first post-war cars engineered from scratch by Austin, and was said to be styled from a thumbnail sketch by Leonard Lord, chairman of Austin and later the British Motor Corporation (BMC) — though the styling was more likely the work of resident Argentine Austin stylist Dick Burzi. The car was almost certainly influenced by a 1946 Pininfarina-bodied Alfa Romeo cabriolet, which just happened to end up at the Longbridge factory in mid-1947, a few months before the light blue 16 hp sports prototype made its first appearance in the experimental department and on nearby roads around the factory. A rare edition was a coachbuilt estate car, regularly seen in the 1950s used by a convent in Leith, Scotland. The car had a lifting rear door, and sported unusual curved perspex roof panels. With the government edict of "export or die", and steel allocated only to those who generated much needed revenue, the Atlantic was designed specifically to appeal to North American tastes. The car featured up-to-the-minute detailing, with a wrap around windscreen, composed of a flat glass centre section with tiny curved end panels. The front wings (fenders) sported twin "flying A" hood ornaments and swept down to a rounded tail, with spats enclosing the rear wheels. A centrally mounted third, main beam, headlight was built into the letter-box style air intake grille, and the then unheard of luxury of hydraulically powered windows and hood (convertible top), "flashing indicators" (blinkers) rather than trafficators, (for the United States market at least) and the option of EKCO or HMV Autocrat radios. The range-topping Austin was offered in a variety of "jewelescent" colours with names like "seafoam green" and "desert gold", but few of these new metallics were sold in the UK market. The convertible, a three window, drophead coupe, had a simple fabric top, without rear quarter lights (opera windows), which butted up to