During my decade or so living in The Land of Hope and Glory I noticed that the landed gentry were generally skint (financially bereft). The Labor Party’s death taxes had stripped them of their wealth with the kind of speed and finality that might, well, should shock Bernie Sanders supporters. All that was left: titles and the idea of titles. Sensibly enough, Brits now sell the romantic allure of the English aristocracy — embodied by the enormously wealthy, tax-exempt Royal Family — to foreign tourists and luxury-loving members of the nouveau riche. Enter the Holland & Holland Range Rover . . .
maxim.com‘s glossy feature on the H&H Range Rover is suffused with irony. For one thing, Range Rover, that most British of motor car companies, is owned by India’s Tata Motors. The Empire strikes back! As discretion is the better part of political correctness, that’s all I’m going to say about that. Except to say BMW owns Rolls Royce.
For another, the fact that Maxim magazine is testing Landie’s $244k rolling palace gives one pause for mirth. Despite the reporter’s pocket-square sartorial splendor, I can’t think of a more boorish publication in which to pimp highlight this rolling testament to the English aristocratic lifestyle.
Lastly, the spread was photographed at George Vanderbilt II’s 8k acre estate in Asheville, North Carolina. GVII was an active member of the Sons of the American Revolution, an organization open only to Americans whose ancestor(s) fought against the British in the Revolutionary War. While the multi-lingual multi-millionaire Vanderbilt was probably something of an anglophile, it’s still funny that the oh-so-British Rangie’s posing on the estate of a man whose middle name was Washington.
OK, I’m reading too much into this. The H&H RR is a luxe off-roader with a lockable gun cabinet for shotguns. Which is a cool idea, well-executed. And I love the engraved door pulls (paging Otto Carter!). I just want to point out that the only time I saw Holland & Holland shotguns in the field they were transported there by a Lady who drove a small Peugeot. And bummed a fiver for petrol.