Full review

The Fairford is big for a van conversion, with a layout that offers through-vision. Its Thule awning comes with the £2,500 Premium Pack, without which you’re unlikely ever to see a modern-day Auto-Sleeper. This is a premium product, so you’re hardly likely to want to forgo features like the alloy wheels, reversing camera or cab air-con.

With the twin wind-up sunroofs raised, the sliding door fully retracted and the back doors opened through a full 180⁰, you’ll find no coachbuilt comes close to offering this inside/outside living.

The ‘van enters new territory for Auto-Sleepers in offering four travel seats and beds for four, too. The rear lounge is truncated but can seat four, while up front there’s a pullman dinette.

With a choice of four external colours, the Fairford looks smart, but don’t underestimate the amount of light excluded from the interior by that privacy glass. Thankfully, the light-coloured woodwork and upholstery (one of six choices) stop the interior feeling gloomy.

The gas struts on the rear settee bases make loading easy. Part of one of the lockers is filled with the Combi boiler but we still squeezed bedding in here.

There are shelved and unshelved top lockers throughout the Fairford. With no fixed bed, bedding storage is always a challenge. You have to use the rear-facing front bench seat here, and the overcab shelf gets full of infill cushions.

The twin-door locker at the forward end of the galley has a hanging rail. With space for dry food storage not over-generous, you could get Auto-Sleepers to fit shelves here instead - and drawers alongside the fridge, as the gangway is narrowest here. Both these options are available.

You can sit nine people in here on site, although the front dinette requires two of its possible four occupants to be kids. Wherever you sit (except in the swivel cab seat) you’ll have a convenient reading light.

The rear double is easy to make, although we’d happily forgo the kneerolls for a flatter bed – a change Auto-Sleepers says it will make on all future Fairfords. But up front, there are six extra cushions to add. An improved version with at least three fewer cushions is on the way, we are told.

The galley boasts three burners, an oven/grill, a microwave, an extractor hood and acres of worktop. There’s built-in crockery racking, although the fitted crystal glasses seem extravagant.

Room in the bathroom is not so palatial, but the sliding washbasin tries to offer a solution. Downsides are a lack of storage and the shower head having to double as the basin’s tap.

If Auto-Sleepers resited the shower head to the right (which it might do) this cosy little bathroom would be greatly improved. At least you don’t have a clinging curtain.

The Euro V, 2.2-litre Peugeot engine is a bit gruffer than the rival Fiat’s (which is a 2.3) but we like Auto-Sleeper’s policy of specifying the more powerful 150bhp motor as standard.

This is an abridged version of the full review appearing in the August 2016 issue of What Motorhome. Buy it now.