Summer 2024

Concours d’Elegance’s Con- cours Village. Lichfield, Staffordshire, England is an ancient, charming city that dates to the seventh centur y. It’s home to a massive, three- spired cathedral—the only example of its type in Europe—completed in the 1330s. The five-square mile town sits square in the English Midlands, an area centered around industrial Birmingham that in the 1950s was the world’s largest exporter of automobiles. Rolls Royce, Jaguar, Aston Martin and Morris were among the marques that were produced in the area. It’s only natural that RBW would choose this location for its home. RBW’s new 28,000 square-foot shop, located in a business enclave at the edge of Lichfield, is just as neat, tidy, bright and shiny as the electric sports cars carefully crafted here. The cars are each mounted on wheeled frames and moved along a U-shaped work area where different parts are fitted by hand by a highly-skilled and dedicated staff, all clad in black RBW branded shirts. It’s a remarkably happy environment and these guys are more than willing to show a vis- iting American journalist the intricacies of their work. There’s no sense of rush like one would find in a mass-production auto- mobile factory.The empha- sis here is on getting it right and building the safest, highest quality product possible, utilizing the finest of traditional British handcraftsmanship. Why did RBW choose the roadster and GT body styles? After retiring from his security and alarm systems company, Peter Swain dreamt up the idea of RBW in 2017. He now serves as CEO of the firm.“We sat down as a family and decided what we wanted this to look like. Realizing the industry was going electric.” Incidentally, the word “family” pops up often in any discussion about 144 C A R M E L M A G A Z I N E • S U M M E R 2 0 2 4 Photo: RKP Photography Photo: Ali Kahn Roadster bodies are crafted by an outside firm on original 1960s MG tooling. The hood’s hump is an element from the last MGB series, the V8. The remainder is exactly as they were originally designed. Andrew Langtree uses formidable leather working skills honed at Aston Martin to fashion the interiors of these cars to the highest standard.