I'd never have guessed the chap who designed the 'mate was the mind behind the Lotus - that'd make a great quiz q.
Colin Chapman was actually the mind behind Lotus, especially the racing cars, but Hickman was the guy who gave Lotus their first three big sellers - the Elan, the Europa and the Elan +2. The styling of the Elan was very much influenced by the earlier (original) Elite, but Hickman refined that and introduced the iconic pop-up headlights.
The design/styling of the 1960s Elan was so good that in the 1990s Mazda effectively copied it in (but productionised it to make it practical) their MX-5 sports car, right down to the pop-up headlights (although Chapman's twin cam engine was missing, so it was somewhat less wild) - but when Mazda hit problems in pre-production testing with handling it was Lotus who sorted them out for Mazda.
Sorry to bat on, but I have driven both an original Elan and a twin cam Europa (both owned by a mate, sadly now deceased, who built both from kits) and I was an MX-5 owner for a while, too (about 20 years ago).