The wonderful wagons of Rollo Dunford Wood

The music playing in Rollo Dunford Wood’s workshop in rural Wales is usually folk, often Appalachian, but recently he’s been listening to podcasts about ghosts. “I’ve been enjoying The Witch Farm,” he says of the Danny Robins drama, which is set in the UK’s most haunted house in the Brecon Beacons. Having moved from a cottage in Gloucestershire last year into his late grandfather’s Welsh house, with its wonky beamed ceilings and childhood memories, he’s also surrounded by spectres of sorts. Here, he spends his days restoring historically significant showman’s wagons that had their first life a century ago and are part of the iconography of the colourful carnivals that once travelled with conjurers, sword swallowers and “freaks”.

He shows me around his grandfather’s house. “We think it could be about 800 years old – some parts could be older,” he says of what is now a family home shared with his ceramicist wife Freyja Lee and their two children. Previously, he restored his caravans in a former grain store with capacity for five vehicles. Now he is working in a smaller space but building a barn to help him expand. It’s all part of the process of creation through restoration. “I am fascinated with the original line-work decoration I find under 100 years of paint on these wagons. It makes me think about the people who lived in them – of beautiful vehicles that were also a home,” he says. “I have the same fascination with our house, the different-coloured layers on the thick stone walls, and knowing that there may have been 40-odd generations of folk who have lived inside these walls. I am just the custodian.”

The seed of his future was sown just over 10 years ago when Freyja, then his wife-to-be, expressed an interest in having a decorative wagon that captured the magic of her experiences of living in India and travelling across Mexico on horseback. “It was her birthday, and I bought a dray cart, which is the underside section of a wagon with the wheels, from a traveller in Norfolk. It took me a week to build the accommodation top for it, and I realised that after so long working full time as a carpenter making fancy kitchens, if I could do this for a living instead, I’d be a happy man.” 

My hands are always hungry... I’ll have a go at anything

The couple lived in two midcentury showman’s wagons in rural Oxfordshire for a time. The caravans were parked next to each other on farmland with a fire pit in between them. Even before, Dunford Wood was already living off-grid in a 1970s trailer. When their first child was due in 2018, he quickly set to work on building a barn they could turn into a more domestic space. But mid-build, life threw a curveball. While undergoing successful treatment following a cancer diagnosis, he had a Damascene moment: to do what made him happy – building cabins and wagons. 

“I now build one cabin a year from scratch for clients,” he says. “It can be anything from a £10,000 shed to a £300,000 bungalow. I do that in the summer with a team of tradesmen, and in the winter months I work solely on wagon restoration (which starts from £15,000 and up to £150,000 for special versions). It’s mostly in solitude and meditative: carving, fettling and painting.”

It’s impossible to say how long any restoration project will take. “I lose track of the hours and days,” he says. “I’ve found a wonderful community who are also passionate about the work I’m involved in – metalworkers, signwriters and cut-glass makers. The Heritage Craft Fund has a list of endangered skills, and they fund people who want to train new craftsmen.”

Dunford Wood has trained would-be artisans, but he is also constantly learning new skills. “My hands are always hungry to learn more and understand materials better. I’ll have a go at anything,” he explains. “I had relatively little experience of carving before doing this. I’ve also had to educate my eye to the construction of horse-drawn wagons, and their embellishment and decoration for practical purposes – like a chamfer [a sloping edge between two surfaces], which is an elegant way to reduce the overall weight of a wagon.” 

Such details conjure the charm of vehicles that dominated roads before the motorcar. “I see these objects as folk art,” Dunford Wood says of his revived wagons. “On a prosaic level, I am restoring them to sell to people who want a beautiful thing for their garden. But they had so many lives before. Showmen and farmers and the Roma community used them. Travelling salespeople went from town to town in brush wagons, which were straight-sided, with cubby holes all around the outside and a big rail to hang wicker baskets and pots and pans. Those wagons are particularly rare.”

Finding potential bow-top wagons – and other wooden gems on wheels – involves travelling up and down the country. “I’ve met so many characters and made many friends, all with a story to tell and an appreciation for the art of these beautiful, romantic relics,” Dunford Wood says. Along the way, he has learnt about the history of the master craftspeople who first built the wagons, and the designs that relate to different eras of production. 

“One of the top makers was Thomas Tong, who would have had lots of people working for him. The culture of travelling people was all about bling, and his wagons were highly carved and decorated, while inside they would have had cut-glass mirrors and all the best china. I have one of his kite wagons, built in the 1890s: it has a curved roof but no window at the top,” he says. “After that time, they had celestial windows to let in light and create more headroom. Certain makers had more prestige than others – and after Tong there was George Orton, Sons & Spooner, and the maker William Wheeler. But by the 1950s, people stopped travelling by horse and cart.”

It’s unlikely that Dunford Wood and his family will ever live full-time in a wagon (or two) again. “I’m a complete romantic, and we had a beautiful life when we were living in the ones we had,” he reminisces. “But when I hear rain, my stomach still churns because I expect water to pour through the roof.” His grandfather’s house makes for a forever home, and Dunford Wood may carry on beyond any notion of retirement. “I see myself in old age having restored my prized Tong kite wagon, taking to the road with Freyja, our grandchildren and dogs for trips to the seaside, to forage for samphire and catch mackerel to cook on the beach,” he smiles. “I’ve spent my happiest times in wagons, with a pot of supper bubbling on the fire, and wrapped up warm inside the wood-panelled bed listening to the wind blowing outside. We have forged proper memories in them.”