Moving away from your best attempts to scare Waris off...
As promised, I took a trip down to the Marussia factory earlier today. Incidentally I also went past Mercedes in Brackley - they have proudly displayed a pretty big board declaring themselves 2014 champions with each win inside a silver wreath, a bit like what JPS used to do on the Lotuses with their world titles.
As for Marussia, everything is still inside by the looks of things. There were three or four cars parked outside, and a guy sat at reception. There were quite large and obvious "Lot" labels on stuff so I'm guessing they're inviting interested serious parties around the place to look at some of the bigger machinery and car bits. The open area of the reception off to the side is full of bodywork bits, along with the show car, still all in one piece. I couldn't get a decent shot up close because of the tinted glass unfortunately.
You might be able to make out the Marussia logos still on the glass doors. There's an A4 piece of paper on one of the doors that says something along the lines of "These premises are closed. For access please call... (and then a list of phone numbers, probably the administrators, but I didn't study it in too much detail as the guy on reception looked ready to escort me off site!) Bits of bodywork are just visible through the doors. The car and rest of the bodywork is further off to the right, behind the brown tinted glass. It's worth bearing in mind at this point that this building wasn't built by Marussia. It's the former factory of
Ascari Cars before they hit trouble. I'm pretty sure they had a car featured on Top Gear at one point. It sat empty for a few years before Marussia moved in, in 2011.
The main indicator that the building was the home of an F1 team was the sign on the perimeter fence which runs along the road. This has been covered up for some time now with black bin liners, ironically taped to the sign with Marussia-branded white tape! It's lovely to see the messages of support for Jules around it. They've been there for a little while now, the rain has got to them a little bit but they're all still readable. It's clear that they've been made by younger fans which is a really nice touch. Forza Jules!
And just for reference, in case anyone is curious,
the Marussia factory is this building on Google Maps. The MTC it is not!
The photos were taken from Overthorpe Road, the entrance is to the left of the row of car parking spaces parallel to the road. Looking at it now, I wish I'd gone round the back and checked the entrance onto Dorcas Road. I bet the trucks would have been parked outside. Ah well!
