This Percival Gull monoplane is one of a few surviving examples of Australian engineer Edgar Wikner Percival’s most successful aircraft designs. Percival was fascinated by flight from a young age, and studied engineering in Sydney. He served with the British Royal Flying Corps during the First World War and returned to Australia after the war to start a flight charter company. He was also busy working on his own aircraft designs, and moved to England to co-found the Percival Aircraft Company. In 1932, the company began manufacturing the Gull, a three-seater, low-wing monoplane, in a number of variations. Gulls had aerodynamic light wooden frames covered with doped, or lacquered, fabric. Coupled with a selection of powerful four- or six-cylinder engines, they were faster than many air force fighters. The aircraft above was made in 1936 at Gravesend in Kent, England. A Swiss woman, Ariane Dufaux, bought the plane and took it to Switzerland, under the registration HB-OFU, for her private use. Forty years later, the aircraft was sold to a collector in England, where it was restored and became popular on the air show circuit.