Teenage Dream

By including his 10-year-old boy in the build of his tidy Toyota, Steve Cartlidge has not only created a stunning Celica gt-four, but he’s also inspired his son to chase his own automotive ambitions.

- Dan Sherwood 

They say that if you start your children off with a tuning habit, then, when they grow up, they won’t have enough money for a drug habit. Well, if that’s true, then Durham based Toyota-fan Steve Cartlidge has ensured his son, Connor, will be staying narcotics-free for life. You see, as a life-long petrol head, Steve’s love of performance four-wheelers has rubbed off on his son, but it wasn’t until they embarked on a project build together that this influence planted the seed that would ultimately shape his son’s future.

‘I’d had a fair few performance cars over the years, such as M-series BMWs and even a flighty Westfield,’ explains the 56-year-old speed freak. ‘But I’d never tried a fast Japanese car. The only cars I’d owned that hailed from the Far East were family cars such as Corollas, Carinas and an Avensis, but nothing exciting.’

All that changed, however, in 2011 when Steve decided it was high time to pop his Japanese performance car cherry and bag himself something that he could work on with his then ten-year-old, car-mad son.

‘I was thinking of getting a Supra originally,’ recalls Steve. ‘As I’ve always had Toyotas in the past, so thought it would be nice to continue the theme with the mighty twin-turbo coupe.’

But while wanting a Supra is one thing: finding a suitably unfettled and unmolested example for the right price is another matter entirely and Steve and Connor struggled to source the right car to act as the basis of their planned build.