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Theo Gibson was born in Dunedin, but has lived in Auckland for the majority of his life. Theo’s first car was a 1990 Automatic Subaru Sedan, which he affectionately named ‘Burgundy’. In the time he owned Burgundy he managed to destroy her passenger door while backing out a driveway in Titirangi, so she had a mismatched white one for the rest of her time with him. Burgundy had a brilliant ability to have some catastrophic failure when going on holiday or moving house, but till this day Theo’s first love lingers fondly in his memory.
Theo comes from a family background where creativity reigns supreme, but where the tv remote never had batteries. He learned to fill the gaps from many remote dilemmas to more complex technical mysteries. His thirst for tinkering took him to the outskirts of his clan, where he found a DIY mentor in his grandfather, Max Rands. Max is a keen inventor and chemist, who, in his early years, built a three wheel car out of a motor bike, side car and some paper mache. Still going strong at 95, he is the proud owner of two electric scooters and continues to inspire Theo with his kiwi ingenuity.
Theo works as a freelance Audio Visual Technician and Designer for theatre and film, and has been a fixture of the Screen Arts department at Unitec School of Performing and Screen Arts for five years.
The idea for this project came to Theo after watching Chris Pain’s documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?”. He was inspired to build his own, and make the process accessible for others to get them back on the road. These days Theo spends every spare moment rallying anyone he can to help him to build this Electric car. He dreams of hearing only the sound of car tyres on the road.
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