Kevin Macliver, an innovative engineer and devoted father of four, is the mastermind behind it Multimaca range of three and four seater child seats in various widths which can hold children from birth to 12 years and beyond and are expertly designed to suit any car from a Mini to a Rolls Royce.
His garage invention, inspired by the birth of his fourth child, has since evolved into a thriving £2.5m-a-year international business. Driven by his unwavering passion for engineering, Macliver seeks to create ingenious solutions to everyday challenges and encourage more families to have more than two children.
My car of choice
In my previous life, I drove 40,000 miles a year around the UK and Europe, so a car was more of a tool than a fashion item, and I tend to keep cars for a long time – generally Mercedes. Two of my last five cars did over 300,000 miles and the other three over 200,000. Now I prefer classics to new cars. I have a Mercedes 560 SEC that I’ve owned for 31 years, and a G-Wagen that I’ve owned for 26 years, and a new Cayenne and a few others. My dream car since childhood was a Mercedes Gullwing, but recently it has become a 2006 Porsche Carrera GT.
My favorite holiday destination
Italy – very British – Tuscany; just love the family oriented lifestyle, architecture, scenery, weather and food. The hospital was also very good, when I broke my shoulder.
My device I can’t live without
I don’t want to be too predictable, but as a traveling businessman, my smartphone. I had an early Blackberry and I was a lawyer, but eventually I too had to give it up and get an iPhone. We take it for granted now, but I remember having a phone in the early eighties, and someone called me in my office: it was diverted to my mobile where I was with my daughter doing a riding lesson, and when the horse neighed out loud the caller couldn’t believe it.
I go to the fashion brand
Back then, when we wore suits and ties, I wore daks, favored by farmers and landed gentry types. Dax then went through a metrosexual phase and lost that classic style, but I still have some. Nowadays, in less formal times I think it’s Gant and Levi. Equally important are the shoes: growing up near Northampton was Church’s factory shop. My younger brother met a Swedish au pair in a local village when he was 20 and immigrated to Sweden. He recently bought Sweden’s oldest company, Troentorp Toefl, and is expanding into Chelsea Boots. I am currently ‘testing’ a new model for it.
My airline of choice
In my previous life I did a lot of work in different factories in Europe and factories don’t tend to be in big cities. Ryanair tended to use military type airfields often 50-100 miles from the city they were supposed to be flying to, but happened to be about 10 miles from the factories I was visiting so I used them often, very convenient. Otherwise, British Airways is the favourite.
My favorite watch brand
I find watches technically very interesting, but I don’t collect them. My parents gave me an Omega Speedmaster for turning 21str birthday, and I’ve worn it every day since and can’t imagine having another.
My favorite restaurant
My in-laws will go on a three-week holiday and come back and describe it meal by meal. but in my day-to-day life, I consider food to be fuel, and I’m frustrated that snacks take up so much time out of my day. Having said that, I love the social aspect of a family meal or dinner. My favorite restaurant is probably Il Teatro in Cortona [Italy] where we go as a family most years. It’s a simple Italian family restaurant with traditional food, albeit with a number of individual dining rooms furnished with classic furniture and the walls are absolutely covered in mismatched photo frames of the many actors and movie stars who have visited.
My guilty pleasure
Apart from the cars (I have about 12 at the moment) they are probably long baths. Having a large family and friends to accompany you is a way to get some peace and catch up on reading. The famous racing car designer Gordon Murray noted that as you lie in a bath, the hot water opens up your blood vessels and increases flow to your brain, and as a designer/engineer I have often stepped into a bath with a problem and come out . with a solution in the same way as Archimedes.
My favorite way to donate
We’ve always had a big house with lots of bedrooms and with kids, friends and a sociable wife, I’m used to getting up and seeing people in the kitchen I’ve never seen before. My son now lives and works in San Francisco, and recently married a beautiful girl with, among other family, a Ukrainian grandmother, shortly after Vladimir Putin took over. Naturally, we asked if there was anything we could do, and they induced a family to come and live with us in the rooms vacated by our grown children. That was over two years ago and they are still here. They have degrees and left an apartment and car and good professional jobs, but came here with a child and two suitcases. We bought them a car, and they are now part-time cleaners while they perfect their English and either stay, or eventually come back. Tragic, but like many.