Mini are these days owned by BMW. But before the ‘new’ Mini was the 1959 original, which was actually first called the Austin ‘Seven’ and not the ‘Mini’ at all. And that’s because it had an even smaller predecessor, the pre-Second World War Austin 7, a car that was also – weirdly – BMW’s first.

Produced under license in-between Britain and Germany killing one another and then Britain and Germany killing one another again, almost 10,000 Austin 7-based BMW Dixis were built, before BMW designed their first in-house model in the early-’30s (although this still used a licensed Austin engine).

This lovely recreation of the BMW Dixi 3/15 comes from SvenJ. of Flickr, who has captured the German Austin 7 beautifully. There’s more to see at Sven’s ‘BMW Dixi 3/15’ album and you can head back to 1920s Germany via the link above.