The Invicta name lay dormant for many years, before being acquired in 1980 by Michael Bristow, who had an ambition to produce a modern supercar that captured the values and ethos of the pre-war cars, and could deservedly live up to the slogan for the pre-war S type of ‘The most wonderful performance in the world’.

The Wiltshire based Invicta Car Company launched the thoroughly modern S1 coupe at the British International Motor Show in 2002, and immediately received road test requests from hundreds of potential customers, with the first customer car being proudly handed over eleven months later.

The front engine, rear wheel drive coupe featured a 4.6 litre, 32 valve Ford Mustang V8 engine, with manual or automatic gearbox options, race-bred suspension, and a one-piece carbon fibre bodyshell bonded to a steel space-frame chassis. Initially offering a power output of 320 bhp, and then 420 bhp, this was later eclipsed by the fabulous supercharged 5 litre V8 S1-600 that boasted an impressive output of almost 600 bhp.

The S1 coupe appeared at various events including the Goodwood Festival of Speed, and the Brooklands Centenary Festival, and always attracted a great deal of interest, but sadly it was not to be, and after producing a small number of cars to order, the company eventually closed in 2012.