The well-known novelist Nevil Shute (N.S.Norway) started Airspeed in the 1930's and his autobiography Slide Rule has some great stuff on how aircraft were designed and built in those days. The earliest Airspeed aircraft were frankly ugly, the Ferry looked like a chicken shed with wings, but things quickly improved, and the Ensign and its variant the Envoy, which was used by the Royal Flight, were very pretty little aeroplanes.
I must admt I was under the impression that by the time the Ambassador came out the company had been absorbed by De Havilland, but I may be wrong. Either way I thought it was a handsome aeroplane, a sort of little sister to the glorious Connie. I regret never having seen one, especially in light of The SSK's post, as I was a schoolboy in Carlisle in the early 60s and could easily have cycled out to the airport had I known. 18/- single to Newcastle and hitch-hike back would have been do-able as well - just!