At the time of the split, the show’s producers contended that China left “to pursue other projects”. He says, wry smile inch-perfect, he didn’t have any other projects, and that he left because they wanted to reduce the screen time and gravitas given to covering his mechanical exploits. Brewer, meanwhile, mixed polite public announcements with being caught off-guard saying some very ungenerous things about China’s ego and ability. Today, China shrugs the shrug of a man who’s more into actions than words – “Mike and I had an on-screen chemistry that worked; I loved it while it lasted and I wish him well” – while Brewer and sidekick Ant Anstead continue to soak up the Hollywood rays.

“Do you know what? It was like living a dream out there,” reflects China. “It was brilliant, but never real – and it never felt like it was going to be forever. We found this amazing place to live right on the beach; we could watch whales swimming by, for goodness sake. We’d go for breakfast in the morning, ice cream in the evening, long drives into the scenery. Don’t get me wrong, my wife Imogen and I loved it. It was special. But it was a bit… well, fake. You could lap it up and enjoy it – and, trust me, we did – but you couldn’t live like that forever. Not if you wanted to keep your sanity and sense of perspective.”

So what do you do next when you’ve relocated your life to Hollywood to front a blockbuster television show, only to be told it has all come to a crashing end just weeks before you had planned to start filming again? “I don’t need sympathy, and we had a ball, but everyone on the show worked so hard,” China says. “We filmed episode after episode, day after long day, no holidays. Aside from organising to get everything we’d moved out there back to England, it was nice to be free again – to explore the possibilities that are out there. I’ve rarely had plans; I prefer to bounce between the opportunities that come up.”

If that all sounds a bit like it’s from the book of excuses for former television stars, it’s worth dwelling on China’s backstory. It’s fair to say that, before his televisual break, he lived and loved his life by following his whims. That dates right back to spending every waking moment playing Lego as a kid (but never following the instructions), to living in a big red bus as a student, to carving out the career that led to his job in front of the cameras by designing and engineering drivable sofas, bathrooms, offices, sheds and even a giant shopping trolley. Freedom means more to him than most, for reasons perhaps deeper than most.