This NYC Shop’s Restores Land Rover Defenders for a New Generation

It was almost two decades ago when Daniel Marcello, founder of the Land Rover restoration shop Brooklyn Coachworks, found a North American-spec Defender 90 on eBay and bought it from a guy in South Carolina. Back then, classic Defenders weren’t very common in the U.S., but Marcello had fallen in love with the car as a teenager, and buying one was the continuation of what has become a lifelong passion.

Nowadays, at his shop Brooklyn Coachworks in Williamsburg, he’s turned that passion into a thriving business, selling restored Defenders to clients who want a car with some of the modern conveniences like air-conditioning, heated seats, electric windows, and a backup camera, all while retaining the facade of an automotive classic. Marcello encourages his clients to use their cars for more than just runs to the grocery store, too, like he did when he bought his 18 years ago.

“I immediately off-roaded it,” Marcello said.

Marcello founded Brooklyn Coachworks in 2018 at a space on Kent Avenue in Williamsburg, where it still is based, supplemented now with shops in Italy, Virginia, and a new storefront in West Palm Beach, Florida. The business started as a hobby.

“I was building Land Rover defenders for some friends here and there, and then kind of transitioned into a full-time gig,” Marcello said. “Building these were always my passion. They were the type of car I loved.”

Classic Land Rover Defenders were built from 1983 until 2016, though they were only sold in the U.S. from 1993 until 1997, meaning they still remain somewhat rare on American streets. In Europe, they are common, plentiful, even, owing to their durability and the devotion of Defender owners. The gap in availability presents an opportunity to restorers like Marcello, who sources the vast majority of his Defenders from overseas and does the legwork of finding, restoring, and upgrading the cars for clients paying $160,000 and more.

Brooklyn Coachworks offers a variety of new-old Defenders: beginning with a classic Defender outfitted with a rebuilt five-cylinder turbodiesel and a five-speed manual transmission to one with an automatic transmission and a GM-sourced LT1 engine, which has powered Corvettes. Brooklyn Coachworks will also build an all-electric version on request.

Marcello says his clients are roughly 50-50 split between men and women, and a full spectrum of ages. Brooklyn Coachworks typically restores around two dozen cars a year. That’s more than enough for the business to keep busy, but not too many, such that each Defender Brooklyn Coachworks produces remains unique.

“I think [25 cars a year] is a good number where the car is special to you and it looks the way you want,” Marcello said.

Brooklyn Coachworks is not the only player in the world of Land Rover restoration, far from it, but the shop stands out for doing restorations that are more muted than they could be. In general, Marcello aims for a slightly heightened version of Land Rover reality, but not too heightened.

“There’s a bunch of different builders out there,” Marcello said. “I think a lot of ’em stay into their own focus of almost blinging out the cars or pimping ’em out a little bit too much. We’re more of a, keeping it simple, keeping it original, keeping what Land Rover did back in the day. Our main focus is on just build-quality, the galvanizing, the paint work, the leather work, making these as simple as they can be, but also taking what Land Rover did originally, just upping it maybe 10 to 15 percent.”

Marcello has maintained a friendly relationship with Jaguar Land Rover, and has helped restore a Defender for the company in the past. The company debuted a new Land Rover Defender in 2019, which is very much a modern car, but for a very different audience than the kind of customer Marcello caters to. He also thinks clients are attracted to Brooklyn Coachworks because, for many years now, he’s lived the Land Rover life.

“I’ve driven these cars through Africa, Australia, Iceland,” Marcello said. “I can drive through Brooklyn all day long. I can drive to Maine and back, and I can send this car to Africa and do the Sahara Desert, but it’s all kind of based on my own real-world experience.”