Mr. Snyder Builds His Dream Car
Restorers in England’s Cotswolds, leather artisans in Andalucia, Spain, and mechanics in the United States team up with Todd to transform a ‘98 Land Rover D90 into a modern, luxurious and street-smart SUV.
If the Todd Snyder brand had a mascot, it could easily be an angular, 3,000-pound hulk of British aluminum and duck canvas designed to climb mountains and haul through rivers, desert and mud. It’s a testament to the Defender’s design that it looks at home everywhere from Bond films and Balmoral (the British royal family’s Scottish retreat) to Borneo’s off-road Camel Trophy race. And the body went largely unchanged for seven decades, until Land Rover discontinued the model in 2016 before relaunching it as a modern SUV.
“Whenever I do a moodboard for my collections, I always start with a car, and that car is usually a Defender,” Todd says of the iconic Land Rover design. He’s standing in a Bushwick studio having seen, for the first time, not just any Defender but the one he personally designed — a dream car of sorts, and the final product of a nearly year-long creative process: the Todd Snyder x Balmoral Defender. It’s gleaming under a spotlight on chunky, BFGoodrich all-terrain rubber.
There’s a lot to take in. The vehicle started life as a Euro-spec 1998 model sourced from outside Madrid — an ideal climate for vintage car preservation. It then underwent a full chassis restoration and structural upgrade at Balmoral Defender’s English HQ; a custom interior fit at an automotive atelier in Spain; and an engine swap in America, home of the legendary Chevy small-block V8 (a 6.2-liter, 455 hp LT1, a variant of which powers the Edition One). Along the way, Todd tailored everything from the bespoke exterior paint and custom analog gauges to the stitch detail on the semi-quilted seats, wrapped, like the dash, in a moody gray leather sourced from an elite supplier in Italy.
Like an objet d’art, Balmoral Defender is planning on producing a very limited run, a mere 10 of Edition One, titled “City Black.” The scarcity will only enhance the vehicle’s cult status — especially in America, which stopped importing Defenders in the late ‘90s. Says Todd, “One of my favorite things to do is to look at something old and figure out how to make it new, and this Defender is the perfect example of that.”
In the case of Edition One, “City Black,” that meant keeping the original fitment springs and shocks for a vintage “Defender” feel, while upgrading to a more commuter-friendly 10-speed automatic transmission — albeit one whose gear selector is expertly disguised as an old-school manual shift knob. The interior likewise retains the original’s sparse, almost unfinished vibe, but overlaid with a clean, sumptuous layer of luxury materials. Of all his collaborations, this might be the purest embodiment of the Todd Snyder design ethos.
“Men really enjoy things that are rugged but still refined, and trying to find that blend is where my brand sits,” he says. Looks like the man has found his mascot.
This is your first time seeing the finished product in person, right? What was your first reaction?
Holy shit — that was the first reaction. You see parts of it being made along the way, the paint color or the contrast top, but when it all of a sudden comes together, it’s very surreal. It feels like you're dreaming.
This was a global build, between work in England, Spain and America. How long was the process? I heard 2,000 hours of work time.
You can tell when you see it. Each craftsman had his own special skill set, and each being able to bring their knowledge to this project is what made it great. It’s like when I’m designing clothes — you want to work with the best people to bring it all home.
You talk about often having a picture of a vintage Defender on your moodboard when you’re designing a clothing collection. What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word “Defender”?
We always use the term “rugged gentleman.” A lot of my designs are a combination of military and sartorial influences. This truck epitomizes that.
Being a ground-up redesign, you could have added or subtracted anything. How did you decide how much modern vs. how much classic to have in the final recipe?
It’s hard to balance them. This has all the modern essentials you’d want to have, power steering, power windows...but you still have the classic A/C vent, just like on the original — the details are what really bring it home.
Tell me about the "City Black" color?
Black has always been a signature color for me, but I wanted something with depth. This is called a micro-metallic, and there are probably three different shades it takes on. Depending upon the light, you can’t tell if it’s black or navy. It makes it that much more beautiful, and that much more unique.
Watch the interview with Todd and Josh Condon.
