Best-selling author, journalist and award winning editor Dylan Jones OBE on his new role at Aston Martin, the DB5 and Formula 1
Following on from his tenure as Editor at GQ magazine, Dylan Jones OBE is Editor In Chief of The Evening Standard and Consulting Editor of Aston Martin’s newly refreshed lifestyle magazine.
Best-selling author, journalist and award winning editor Dylan Jones OBE
1. Tell us about your involvement with, and the direction of, Aston Martin’s new lifestyle magazine
I’ve been consulting for them, helping turn the magazine into a genuine luxury title. It’s been enormous fun.
2. ‘Formula 1, Sports greatest soap opera’….explain
It has everything - speed, tech, travel and Sex. You can’t beat that.
3. For the launch issue of V53 you interviewed Fernado Alonso and wrote, “Personality and cash will get you so far, as will driving ability and technological splash, but without the secret sauce you may as well be playing Hot Wheels or Scalextric.” Has he got the sauce?
He’s got a whole bottle.
Fernando Alonso on the cover of Aston Martin’s V53 magazine
4. Scalextric or match box cars?
Hot Wheels.
5. Your favourite Aston Martin model and why?
DB5. Sex on wheels.
Aston Martin DB5
6. 60 years old this year – how has the BD5 retained it’s status as a symbol of British culture, design and innovation?
Because it is one of the most beautiful cars ever designed.
7. You describe the new DB12 as moving into the future while stepping into the past, how important is this balance of tradition and innovation?
Crucial. And Aston Martin do it better than most.
8. Following an epic 21 year tenure as the Editor of GQ, many of which were the golden age of glossy magazines, what were the best times, and can you share a few of your worst?
The best times would fill a book - which they probably will at some point, but the ambition was always the same, whether we were competing with magazines, newspapers or social media: we needed to make the proposition compelling. Completely compelling. The only downside was the occasional libel writ.
9. Boris Johnson was your car columnist at GQ, worst decision ever?
Best decision ever. People never stop talking about it.
10. Worth the £4,000 in parking tickets?
Yup.
11. Your wife describes you as the most impatient, irascible, irritating driver it has ever been her misfortune to share a car with – your words BTW– who was yours?
Tracey Emin. Can’t drive.
12. You are renowned for your sartorial style (and written a book on the subject). What are the worst fashion crimes you have seen committed by London men?
Trying to look too young.
13. You’ve got 60 seconds to sell me a car. Which one?
You buy the one the suits you. I’ve driven a Range Rover for the last 20 years because it does’ everything I need it do.