Park Ward was a British

coachbuilder A coachbuilder or body-maker is someone who manufactures bodies for passenger-carrying vehicles.Construction has always been a skilled trade requiring a relatively lightweight product with sufficient strength. The manufacture of necessarily ...

founded in 1919 which operated from

Willesden Willesden () is an area of northwest London, situated 5 miles (8 km) northwest of Charing Cross. It is historically a parish in the county of Middlesex that was incorporated as the Municipal Borough of Willesden in 1933, and has forme ...

North London North London is the northern part of London, England, north of the River Thames. It extends from Clerkenwell and Finsbury, on the edge of the City of London financial district, to Greater London's boundary with Hertfordshire. The term ''nor ...

. In the 1930s, backed by

Rolls-Royce Limited Rolls-Royce was a British luxury car and later an aero-engine manufacturing business established in 1904 in Manchester by the partnership of Charles Rolls and Henry Royce. Building on Royce's good reputation established with his cranes, they ...

, it made technical advances which enabled the building of all-steel bodies to Rolls-Royce's high standards. Bought by Rolls-Royce in 1939, it merged with H. J. Mulliner & Co. in 1961 to form

Mulliner Park Ward Mulliner Park Ward was a bespoke coachbuilder in Hythe Road, Willesden, London UK. Mulliner now is the personal commissioning department for Bentley. Mulliner Park Ward was a subsidiary of Rolls-Royce and made bespoke bodies in London for ...

History

Park Ward was founded in 1919 by William MacDonald Park and Charles Ward; they had worked together at F.W. Berwick Limited, the makers of Sizaire-Berwick cars. They built their first Rolls-Royce body in 1920. After producing bodies for a variety of cars in the early 1920s, Park Ward became particularly associated with

W O Bentley Walter Owen Bentley, MBE (16 September 1888 – 13 August 1971) was an English engineer who founded Bentley Motors Limited in London. He was a motorcycle and car racer as a young man. After making a name for himself as a designer of aircraft a ...

's new business, manufacturing their chassis nearby at

Cricklewood Cricklewood is an area of London, England, which spans the boundaries of three London boroughs: Barnet to the east, Brent to the west and Camden to the south-east. The Crown pub, now the Clayton Crown Hotel, is a local landmark and lies north ...

. In 1922, they were asked by

Rolls-Royce Rolls-Royce (always hyphenated) may refer to: * Rolls-Royce Limited, a British manufacturer of cars and later aero engines, founded in 1906, now defunct Automobiles * Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, the current car manufacturing company incorporated in ...

to take part in a scheme to make standard bodies for their small

Twenty Twenty or 20 may refer to: * 20 (number), the natural number following 19 and preceding 21 * one of the years 20 BC, AD 20, 1920, 2020 Music Albums * ''20'' (2nd Chapter of Acts album), 1992 * ''20'' (Cunter album), 2011 * ''20'' (Drag ...

model, but the project was abandoned, although they did build bespoke bodies for Rolls-Royce customers exhibiting a 40-50 model at the

British Empire Exhibition The British Empire Exhibition was a colonial exhibition held at Wembley Park, London England from 23 April to 1 November 1924 and from 9 May to 31 October 1925. Background In 1920 the British Government decided to site the British Empire Exhibi ...

in 1924. From the mid-1920s, the company started to concentrate on Bentley and Rolls-Royce models.Nick Walker. ''A-Z of British Coachbuilders''. Bay View Books 1997. By 1930, 90% of all of Park Ward's efforts were for Rolls-Royce. After the Rolls-Royce take-over of Bentley in 1931, Rolls-Royce took a stake in Park Ward. Beginning in 1933, when they obtained patents, Park Ward developed a technically interesting all-steel saloon in conjunction with Rolls-Royce, and from 1936 offered it on the 4¼-litre Bentley chassis. These bodies were supported by ''

Silentbloc A bushing or rubber bushing is a type of vibration isolator. It provides an interface between two parts, damping the energy transmitted through the bushing. A common application is in vehicle suspension systems, where a bushing made of rubber ...

'' rubber bushes to reduce road-shock engine-noise and vibration. The cars were produced in small batches, giving quite noticeable economies in manufacture, with a consequent reduction in selling price. By 1937, as many as ten cars a week were passing through Park Ward's works, and in 1939, Rolls-Royce completed its acquisition of the business. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Park Ward continued to produce special coachwork, and the all-steel technology was used by Rolls-Royce to produce a standard body range on its cars, starting with the

Bentley Mark VI The Bentley Mark VI is an automobile from Bentley which was produced from 1946 until 1952. The Mark VI 4-door standard steel sports saloon was the first post-war luxury car from Bentley. Announced in May 1946 and produced from 1946 to 1952 it w ...

. Twenty years later, Park Ward was merged with H. J. Mulliner & Co. in 1961 to form

. Mulliner Park Ward operations were centralised in the former Park Ward factory in

. In 1971, the division was retitled Rolls-Royce Motors Ltd.

Bugatti Royale coachwork

1933 Bugatti Type 41 limousine (8002865681)

Captain Cuthbert W. Foster, heir to the

Bird's Custard Bird's Custard is the brand name for the original powdered, egg-free imitation custard powder, now owned by Premier Foods. Custard powder and instant custard powder are the generic product names for similar and competing products. The product ...

fortune, commissioned Park Ward to build a body onto his newly acquired

Bugatti Royale The Bugatti Type 41, better known as the Royale, is a large luxury car built from 1927 to 1933 with a 4.3 m (169.3 in) wheelbase and 6.4 m (21 ft) overall length. It weighs approximately 3,175 kg (7,000 lb) and uses a ...

, the fourth one built (chassis number 41-131). Fashioned on a favorite Rolls-Royce he had previously owned, the car is known as the ''Foster'' car or ''Limousine Park-Ward''. After being acquired in 1963 by

Fritz Schlumpf The brothers Giovanni "Hans" Schlumpf (February 1904, in Omegna, Italy – 1989) and Federico "Fritz" Schlumpf (February 1906, in Omegna, Italy – April 18, 1992) were Swiss textile industrialists and collectors of automobiles. They are best kn ...

from American

Bugatti Automobiles Ettore Bugatti was a German then French manufacturer of high-performance automobiles. The company was founded in 1909 in the then-German city of Molsheim, Alsace, by the Italian-born industrial designer Ettore Bugatti. The cars ...

collector John Shakespeare, the car now resides at the Musée National de l'Automobile de Mulhouse in France, alongside Ettore Bugatti's personal Royale, the ''Coupé Napoleon''.

Gallery

File:Rolls Royce FW 1819.jpg, 1928 Rolls-Royce Twenty

landaulette A landaulet, also known as a landaulette, is a car body style where the rear passengers are covered by a convertible top. Often the driver is separated from the rear passengers by a division, as with a limousine. During the first half of the 2 ...

File:1937 Bentley 4-14 Litre 6069437050.jpg, 1937 4¼-litre Bentley sports saloon File:Park Ward Bentley S1 Continental & R-type Continental DHCs 6068880237.jpg, 1956 and 1954 Bentley Continental drophead coupés File:Nationale oldtimerdag Zandvoort 2010, 1960 ALVIS TD 21 PARK WARD CONVERTIBLE pic2.JPG, 1960

Alvis Alvis may refer to: *Alvis Car and Engineering Company, British luxury car and military vehicle manufacturer which later became Alvis plc *Alvis plc (formerly United Scientific Holdings plc), a defence contractor which acquired Alvis Cars and beca ...

TD21 drophead coupé

References

Notes

External links