Our History
The Dunsfold Collection of Land Rovers is a registered charity dedicated to the preservation of Land Rover history. The Collection was started in 1968 by Brian Bashall who realised that his love of strange prototype and pre-production Land Rovers was of interest to others.
At that time Land Rover itself was not interested in retaining these wonderful prototypes which are part of Britain’s transport heritage and without Brian’s foresight and enthusiasm many of these vehicles would have been lost forever.
Brian’s interest in Land Rovers was founded back in 1953, when his girlfriend’s father told Brian that he couldn’t take his daughter out on his Vincent motorbike. The purchase choices facing Brian were a Jowett Bradford van, a Ford Prefect or a secondhand Land Rover. To his eternal credit, Brian chose the Land Rover and soon developed a passion and enthusiasm for these iconic vehicles that led to him acquiring the first vehicles that were to form the nucleus of the Dunsfold Collection and, in due course, establishing a specialist parts and servicing business.
The Transport Trust, which is the UK’s only national charity established to promote and encourage the preservation and restoration of Britain’s unique transport heritage in all its forms, recognised the importance of Brian’s work in 2003 when it awarded him a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Over the years, the Dunsfold Collection has expanded to include not only prototype and pre-production vehicles but examples of almost every model made by Land Rover from 1947 to the present day, including military vehicles, record-breakers, Royal cars, limited editions and display vehicles. The Collection is managed by Brian’s son, Philip, who is also an internationally recognised expert on the Land Rover marque, and now has over 130 Land Rover and Range Rover cars.
The Dunsfold Collection opened its museum building on 11 June 2023, where up to 40 vehicles are displayed on rotation from the total of over 130 in the Collection’s care. The museum also houses an unrivalled archive of Land Rover brochures, publicity material, manuals, handbooks, photographs, drawings and magazines, together with the extraordinary John Parker collection of Land Rover models and toys.
Vehicles from the Collection are also displayed at various Land Rover and classic vehicle events throughout the year and further details can be found in our News section. In addition, Jaguar Land Rover and other organisations regularly make use of the Collection’s vehicles for press and marketing events, vehicle launches, motor shows and film work and the Collection’s cars appear regularly in the motoring press.
In 2014 the Dunsfold Collection became a registered charity and is now managed by a Board of Trustees who are Philip Bashall, Richard Beddall, Andrew Munden, and Gary Pusey. The trustees want to ensure the vehicles, the wonderful collection of model Land Rovers, and the Dunsfold archive are safeguarded for the enjoyment of future generations.
The Charity
The Dunsfold Collection was granted Charitable Trust status in 2014. The Charity’s aim is to preserve its unique and continually expanding collection of Land Rover vehicles and its extensive document archive for the benefit of future generations.Since 1948, Land Rover has made a significant contribution to British engineering, manufacturing, cultural and trading history.
The first Land Rover was the car that transformed the fortunes of the Rover company and allowed it to exceed the Government’s imposed targets for export sales, while the Range Rover was one of the few global success stories to come out of British Leyland and was the car that arguably created the worldwide SUV market.
Our People
The Dunsfold Collection is managed by a board of trustees.
The board is chaired by Philip Bashall who is the general manager of the Collection. The other trustees are Richard Beddall, who is the co-owner of Land Rover Experience London, Gary Pusey, who is one of the co-authors of ‘First Fifty’, the definitive history of the Prototype, Pre-production and Press Launch Range Rovers, and Andrew Munden, who is secretary of the Land Rover Register 1948-1953 and Norfolk area rep for the Land Rover Series One Club.
Philip, Richard, Gary and Andrew are lifelong Land Rover enthusiasts.
The Collection also relies heavily on Volunteers from among the Friends of the Collection, whose hard work and dedication make our biennial Open Weekend possible. Josh Richardson is our assistant curator, working closely with Philip on vehicle servicing and building and site maintenance. Jan and John Richardson are in charge of event hospitality, providing a friendly welcome and tea, coffee and cakes to our private tour guests, as well as managing the preparation and sale of bacon rolls, tea, coffee, cakes, and soft drinks at our public open days.
Greg King is crew chief for the Collection archive, arranging working parties of volunteers to examine, file and catalogue the vast quantity of material in out archive rooms. Paul New leads event resourcing, a critical role that ensures we have the right volunteer teams in place for our public events, covering guest welcome, car parking, merchandise sales, and museum building guides and stewards. John Mill is in charge of vehicle preparation, which is about ensuring that our vehicles look their best for our visitors.
Alistair Williamson provides invaluable help on estate and property management, and Paul Whitehead is our health and safety expert. Rick Watts and his team are our building maintenance specialists.
We are always keen to hear from anyone who feels able to help, so if you have the time and the interest, or any specialist skills that you feel will be helpful, please do not hesitate to get in touch!
We would like to thank photographers Craig Pusey and Nick Dimbleby for most of the images of the vehicles in the Collection.
