Rob Dickinson with hiss latest Porsche 911 recreation.

There’s an inside joke behind the name of Rob Dickinson’s new venture, Singer Vehicle Design – but that said, the customized classic Porsches he’s producing are nothing to laugh at.

The irony is that the British entrepreneur set out to earn a degree as an automotive designer at Britain’s Coventry University before taking a detour and becoming the lead singer in the English alternative rock band Catherine Wheel. But, almost by accident, his knack for customizing old Porsches for his own pleasure has turned into a serious business.

The latest example was on display at the 2013 Quail Motosports Gathering earlier this month, decked out in “Singer Racing Blue and Orange,” a color combination meant to celebrate the motorsports era if the 1970s.  There are a number of automotive entrepreneurs who’ve set out to build something new, supercars from Spyker and Pagani quickly coming to mind.  Dickinson, on the other hand, is rebuilding something old.

A modified Singer Porsche interior.

His venture is, in fact, quick specific: it focuses solely on Porsche 911 sports cars built between 1990 and 1994. Known to aficionados as the 964 model, a reference to the German maker’s internal codename, these were the last 911s to use the classic Porsche air-cooled engine and remain cherished for their performance and handling.

“The model produced in ’73 and ’74 was the pinnacle, considered by many to be the best of the classic 911s and a stunning , simply beautiful car,” noted an article in the Ralph Lauren magazine about the Singer venture.

While Dickinson and his team will help a prospective client find a car, if necessary, most clients already have tracked down a well-conditioned 964 Porsche before turning the keys over to Singer.

“We pull the car apart and build it back up from scratch,” Dickinson explained on a blazing hot afternoon in Carmel, California.

Another recent Singer project.

While the final product, like the one on display at the Quail concours, might look like an old 964-model Porsche 911, it will have undergone some massive modifications. These include new, super-light carbon fiber body panels, a heavily updated engine, all-new Brembo brakes, as well as new gauges, among other things.

Specced out and re-build by Cosworth, the original 3.6-liter engine gets new pistons, connecting rods, state-of-the-art fuel injectors and electronic controls, a process that takes about 70 manhours. That bumps the numbers up from the original 252 horsepower to 360, noted Dickinson.  That results in 0 to 60 times of less than four seconds and a top speed of around 160 mph.

Each and every vehicle is, in a sense, a work of art as no two Porsches brought to Singer Vehicle are quite the same and the final product undergoes a lot of customization, perhaps no surprise considering the entire process will cost at least $350,000 “for a rather less-extensive” restoration, while a more extensive job “goes north of $500,000 very easily,” according to Dickinson.

The Singer Vehicle venture brings things full circle for Dickinson, who started his adult life as an industrial design student at Coventry but quickly decided “the boredom would kill me.”  He wound up in rock band Catherine Wheel which earned him some notoriety in the indie rock circle but far less money than one might imagine for a “rock star.”

He started building his own 911s as a personal hobby but after moving to Los Angeles in 2003 found himself repeatedly being asked if he would sell his modifications. “In 2008, we started doing it properly,” and decided to turn it into a business.

So far, Dickinson noted, Singer has finished its 12^th restoration with another 10 jobs in waiting at its facility near Burbank, California.

Singer clients have come from around the world, with cars already shipped to France, Sweden, Indonesia and Hong Long, among other places. The car on display at the Quail was soon to head off for Dubai. It was given a special “second skin” interior treatment to evoke a stripped-down race car interior, including carbon fiber seats with integral shoulder supports and adjustable headrests, saving 175 pounds of mass.

Spend a little time with Dickinson and while he clearly hopes to turn a profit with Singer Vehicle Design you realize this is as much about passion as it is a business venture. “The essence of the Porsche 911 is vivid and unique,” he explained. “We’re simply trying to bottle and preserve it for our customer to savor.’’