Chris Heighton, owner of Heighton Restorations in Bieseker Alberta has many years of experience under his belt building all kinds and all types of vehicles in his shop. Three shops actually. Chris and his team build some of the most high end cars, restorations, street rods, restomods etc. One of the friendliest and most humble people you will ever meet in the car industry and you would never guess the talent and experience that exists behind his doors.
Chris actually owns three buildings in the downtown area as he has continued to grow since originally opening his doors in town.
I most recently got the opportunity to photograph some of the builds that they have put out recently and Chris was awesome enough to give us a tour of his operation and talk about the history of his company for another episode of Blue Collar Garage Culture Shop. You can watch the full episode on our YouTube channel and check out some of the cool projects they are currently working on.
Chris goes above and beyond on all of his builds and even tackles the top end of the concourse restorations. Over the years Chris has built a wealth of knowledge and even has a library in one of his building containing binders and binders of research, development, processes, and pictures from each and every build he has ever done. He has a personal interest for classic Buicks and nailhead motors and is even a leading expert in Buick GS and Buick GSX restorations.
Chris has amassed a large collection of project vehicles himself which you can see some of them in the video including a Buick Riviera, a 1964 Chevelle Wagon, and a Camaro RS/SS that Chris started building in the early 80’s when they decided to hold of on the project. The customer took the car and put it in storage and left his final bill unpaid. The customer ended up working overseas until almost 40 years later he reached back out to Chris to let him know that he was still working overseas and needed to get rid of the car. Admitting that he still owed the shop money Chris got a good deal and picked it up.
The car ended up being a complete time capsule of his work from 40 years ago and even had a list of things to do, handwritten by Chris from the 80’s in the glove box.
The car had been untouched and stored away the entire time and is know one of Chris’ personal cars in the works to be finished with that incredible story to go along with it.
Some other cool features in these historic buildings that Heighton Restorations occupies is a plethora of artwork and murals done by Dwight Lockhart from Victoria British Columbia. Most notably a large mural celebrating 25 years in Bieseker from 2020 that is of a bunch of the iconic builds that have been completed by Heighton and his team.
Make sure you go check out the video to see the awesome projects in the works like a Pantera, several mustangs, and Camaros, Corvettes, and Mopars.
As always huge shoutout to Blue Collar Garage for being apart of these shop tours and articles and supporting the work that we do. Go to bluecollargarage.com and start looking at affordable shop and warehouse solutions available to you throughout central Alberta.
Words and Photos by Brian Holzli
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