Vintage Land Rover Restoration Specialist Opens New Showroom in Flamingo Park

What’s the best way to sell a meticulously restored 1999 Land Rover Defender Model 90?

According to Daniel Marcello, owner of Brooklyn Coachworks in Williamsburg, just take one out for a joyride.

Heads will turn.

“I’ll be stopped at a red light next to a brand new Ferrari and everybody who walks by will look at my car,” Marcello says. “I have an arles blue soft-top Model 90. I take the top off and the windshield folds down on the hood. It’s just something people don’t see every day.”

Having just opened his new showroom in West Palm’s Flamingo Park neighborhood, Marcello has spent the last couple of months familiarizing himself with the South Florida market and experiencing the Palm Beach winter scene for the first time.

Originally from Binghamton, Marcello, 44, has been living in Brooklyn for over 20 years. Now that he’s spending significant time down south, he’s getting used to a decidedly different kind of January and February.

“I’m loving the warm weather and trying to see if the snowbird life works for me,” he says.

While the new Flamingo Park showroom is technically open Monday through Friday for walk-ins, Marcello prefers to show his vehicles by appointment for now. He currently has three different Defenders available for ride-and-drives with potential customers and plans to add more models as demand dictates.

Given what he does and the way he does it, personal test drives make complete sense. Marcello is a quintessential specialist – the embodiment of an artisan luxury car restorer plying his trade in a very specific niche.

“I tell my customers that I’m a one-trick pony,” he deadpans. “But I do that trick very well.”

Though he occasionally works on other vehicles, Marcello performs the vast majority of his restorations on three classic Land Rover models: the Defender 90, the Defender 110 and less often, the Defender 130.

Your average non-gear head probably isn’t aware that due to federal law, all imported vehicles not purchased through an authorized U.S dealer or manufacturer must be at least 25 years old in order to be shipped into the country for sale. In a nod to the incredible lobbying power of the U.S auto industry, the statute applies to SUVs, sedans and virtually anything with four wheels and an engine. For that reason, most of Marcello’s work is performed on Defenders from the late-1990s and now, the 2000 model year.

Ranging in price from approximately $160,000 to $250,000 depending on the complexity of the restoration, each Defender can take between four and eight months to create. Currently, Marcello and his team deliver 20 to 25 vehicles per year. He expects that number to increase once the West Palm location gets fully up to speed.

In addition to his flagship Brooklyn shop, Marcello also has storage and mechanical facilities and staff in Virginia and Asiago, Italy (he has dual American/Italian citizenship). He sources vehicles and whatever original parts he might need from across Europe and Asia.

While Brooklyn Coachworks offers significant upgrade options to the Defender’s chassis, its engine and drivetrain, its interior and much more, Marcello makes sure to point out that his restoration philosophy – from both a mechanical and an aesthetic perspective – is based on a less-is-more mindset.

In other words, if you’re looking for a drastically raised suspension and monster wheels with spinning rims and neon running lights, you need to find a different shop.

“From the beginning, these simple, robust, charming utility vehicles were never overbuilt, so our design process reflects that,” Marcello notes on his website. “The Defender is kept as close to its original design as possible… Since we’ve been testing and building Defenders for 20 years, we’ve developed the perfect formula for both on-road and off-road use.”

So, why do vintage Land Rovers make sense in South Florida?

Calling them “the perfect outfit for West Palm,” Marcello opines that the Defenders he restores offer “classic lines that aren’t overdone.”

“It’s an all-inclusive adventure car that everybody likes to look at,” he adds, pointing out that almost half of his customers are women. ”It doesn’t scream, ‘I’m a tough guy.’ It says, ‘I have good taste.’”

While most of his customers are unlikely to push their Defenders to anything approaching the limits of their performance capabilities, Marcello is a serious off-roader. His love for four-wheel-drive odysseys in exotic locales is what got him into classic vehicle restoration in the first place – and that passion is the fuel that propels his business.

Punch up the “Adventures” tab on the Brooklyn Coachworks site and check out Marcello’s road trips to the Sahara Desert, Iceland’s Ring Road, the Italian Alps, Australia’s Bush Country and many other funky spots.

“If Brooklyn Coachworks fails tomorrow, I’m still gonna be doing the adventuring thing,” he says. ”I sell these cars to finance my trips around the world.”

Beyond their formidable abilities as performance vehicles, Marcello fully understands that the classic lines and vintage cool his Defenders deliver are at least as important as torque and ground clearance. There’s also a certain upscale wow factor that he feels is ideally suited to the South Florida zeitgeist.

“I’ve had girls come by and tell me they love my car while there’s a guy with a Lamborghini behind me,” he says. “They hop in the back and we go for a drive while the guy in the Lamborghini is kicking himself.”