Visited with @Chloe Explores
Set in the beautiful countryside of oxfordshire are the F1 Headquarters for Caterham F1. the site was pretty much a walk on and we started our explore in the offices.
the layout of the building reminded me very much of the Fenhurst ICI site and Television Centre in London that i once had a permission visit to just before the BBC moved. a maze of similar offices and narrow corridors, not a great deal to see really other than a couple of rooms brightened with graffiti and the metal fairies have been busy. one room contained human poo, so that wasn’t very nice and neither was the smell. one offices windows had dead moths stuck to it on the outside and very surprisingly the toilets had not been smashed up.
We moved on and found the room we assume was a showroom, a cinema type room and down where the workshops were, the simulator room.
after this we moved on to the reception area with its huge restaurant area and kitchen. Outside are two stagnant ponds. we didn’t find a way up stairs as we spotted a man in hi-vis quite near by and weren’t too sure if builder (there was the noise of a generator) or security so we decided we had seen enough and left.
History -
In 2010, Malaysian businessman Tony Fernandes had an idea to field a Formula One team and executed it. Soon, Team Lotus was born, alongside two other newcomers for the 2010 F1 season. Then, Fernandes purchased the rights to the Team Lotus name, with the intention of renaming the team.
However, there was a dispute between the two parties over the naming rights. This ended when the Malaysian renamed his team to Caterham. Meanwhile. the original team kept the lotus name and teamed with renault. Coming back to caterham the team was in operation from 2012 until the 2014 F1 season.
Unfortunately the Malaysian team went into administration. This was after a series of lacklustre results and low funding. The situation was so dire that in spite of crowd-funding attempts, they were unable to race in the season finale in 2014. In the following year, the team was put up for auction. This included the £5.5 million Caterham headquarters in Leafield.
Unfortunately, the team never got any bidders and the factory was later abandoned for good. To this day, the buildings stay unoccupied indefinitely.
Prior to that, the factory in Leafield also provided the base for former F1 teams, Arrow and Super Aguri before their respective departures from the sport.
on 25 July 2014, it was announced that over 40 former employees were taking legal action against the team for unfair dismissal, following a number of cost cuts by Caterham F1's new owners.
In November 2014, despite Caterham F1 returning to racing under the control of its administrator following a successful crowdfunding initiative, 230 staff members not directly involved in Grand Prix preparations were made redundant. The staff that were redundant received a redundancy payment in January 2019, over 4 years after the team was declared bankrupt.
Set in the beautiful countryside of oxfordshire are the F1 Headquarters for Caterham F1. the site was pretty much a walk on and we started our explore in the offices.
the layout of the building reminded me very much of the Fenhurst ICI site and Television Centre in London that i once had a permission visit to just before the BBC moved. a maze of similar offices and narrow corridors, not a great deal to see really other than a couple of rooms brightened with graffiti and the metal fairies have been busy. one room contained human poo, so that wasn’t very nice and neither was the smell. one offices windows had dead moths stuck to it on the outside and very surprisingly the toilets had not been smashed up.
We moved on and found the room we assume was a showroom, a cinema type room and down where the workshops were, the simulator room.
after this we moved on to the reception area with its huge restaurant area and kitchen. Outside are two stagnant ponds. we didn’t find a way up stairs as we spotted a man in hi-vis quite near by and weren’t too sure if builder (there was the noise of a generator) or security so we decided we had seen enough and left.
History -
In 2010, Malaysian businessman Tony Fernandes had an idea to field a Formula One team and executed it. Soon, Team Lotus was born, alongside two other newcomers for the 2010 F1 season. Then, Fernandes purchased the rights to the Team Lotus name, with the intention of renaming the team.
However, there was a dispute between the two parties over the naming rights. This ended when the Malaysian renamed his team to Caterham. Meanwhile. the original team kept the lotus name and teamed with renault. Coming back to caterham the team was in operation from 2012 until the 2014 F1 season.
Unfortunately the Malaysian team went into administration. This was after a series of lacklustre results and low funding. The situation was so dire that in spite of crowd-funding attempts, they were unable to race in the season finale in 2014. In the following year, the team was put up for auction. This included the £5.5 million Caterham headquarters in Leafield.
Unfortunately, the team never got any bidders and the factory was later abandoned for good. To this day, the buildings stay unoccupied indefinitely.
Prior to that, the factory in Leafield also provided the base for former F1 teams, Arrow and Super Aguri before their respective departures from the sport.
on 25 July 2014, it was announced that over 40 former employees were taking legal action against the team for unfair dismissal, following a number of cost cuts by Caterham F1's new owners.
In November 2014, despite Caterham F1 returning to racing under the control of its administrator following a successful crowdfunding initiative, 230 staff members not directly involved in Grand Prix preparations were made redundant. The staff that were redundant received a redundancy payment in January 2019, over 4 years after the team was declared bankrupt.
