About us
Based five miles from Aston Martin’s old factory in Newport Pagnell
Whether you want to buy a perfectly original Aston Martin, one that has been fully re-engineered and refurbished, or have your own restored, enhanced or serviced by one of the most experienced teams in the world, Desmond J Smail Limited has the facilities, knowledge and enthusiasm to do the job better than anyone else.
With more than 300 years served between them, virtually all of the technical team at Desmond J Smail have spent their entire careers working with Aston Martins. In fact, some of the cars now being worked on were originally built by the very engineer servicing them today.
Meet the team
Desmond J Smail
Managing Director Desmond is one of the best known characters in the Aston Martin world, having worked with them since 1976. He started off on the spanners, beginning as an apprentice mechanic at well known marque specialist Peter Austen Smith, working on everything from Project 215 to customers’ road cars.
Now, from his office to the deepest recesses of his brain, Desmond represents a treasure trove of all things Aston Martin and races a GT4 in his spare time. Never happier than when he’s chasing down the rumour of a barn-find DB4 from Ireland or tuning a client’s competition car to perfection, there’s probably nobody that has done more miles in a Vanquish than Desmond.
Desmond is also the Managing Director of Aston Sales Kensington and Aston Service London and is highly-regarded across Europe for servicing, restoring and selling models from throughout Aston Martin’s history, and particularly from 1958 to the current era.
Mark Hewitt
After 27 years working in Parts Operations at the Aston Martin, Newport Pagnell site, Mark joined the Desmond J Smail team in 2010. Well known in the world of Aston Martins, his encyclopaedic knowledge of DB4 to Vanquish models and their components enables us to locate even obsolete parts in the shortest possible time. One of our favourite pub games involves quizzing Mark on things such as the part number of the nearside front upright of a 1959 DB4 ...
Joe Dorrill
Born just round the corner from Aston Martin’s Newport Pagnell site, Joe started working as a trimmer for the marque in 1960. Now in his 70s, he has worked on a consultant basis for Desmond J Smail for nearly 30 years, and is a master craftsman in the true sense of the word. Among the cars he has trimmed to perfection is the James Bond Goldfinger DB5 and Prince Charles’s DB6. In fact when the Duchess of Cambridge made her first car journey as a married woman it was on a seat trimmed by our Joe.
Matt Sandall
The youngest member of the team, Matt has worked for Desmond J Smail since 2007 and works on both classic and modern Aston Martins at the East Street workshops. His favourite model is the latest V8 Vantage. Matt’s own car is a well-maintained, much-lowered VW Polo, which has been subjected to a number of changes including the installation of a sound system the size of a small country.