I will be honest with you, I had no idea who John Haynes was before I went to the Haynes Motor Museum. If you are the same, don’t worry, we’ll come to that a bit later, but for now, let me just tell you this museum is 100% worth checking out – I highly recommend it! It is a bit out of the way of everything – for me it was only convenient to visit because we could make it a stop from Bristol to London.
I wanted to arrive prepared, so I looked them up and let me tell you, I was mind-blown by their TikTok/Instagram. I spent half an hour on their Tiktok (because this is how you do social media!) and I immediately knew that I would have a lovely time there. My favorite reel is when 2 volunteers (older gentlemen) go around the cars and describe them with Gen Z expressions. It was so charming and funny that I think everyone should see it – also good intro to the museum – HERE it is.
I also checked out what exhibitions they have and was pleased to see that there is one on WIlliams Racing. I love all kinds of cars but my first love was Formula 1, and I am a faithful person, so I was the most excited about this. I even decided to wear my Williams cap to be appropriate
I got so excited when I arrived that I needed to calm down in order to be able to concentrate and actually enjoy the experience. This is a feeling I get quite often around car museums when there are so many things that are interesting for me and want to check them all out. At the same time. Given that this is not possible, I usually do a quick round, to trick my brain into believing that I gave it what it wanted, while also getting the idea of how big the place is and where my main interests are.
I was actually about to do the same, when Jez showed up. He was the volunteer tasked to answer my questions and show me around. Talking to people also tends to help me relax, so we decided to go around with him, then explore on our own. The volunteer concept was quite foreign to me given that in Hungary, we don’t really have a culture of volunteers in museums, so we asked him about that a little bit.
It is a common practice in England that the museums are operated by charities, and they only have a few full-time employees and a lot of volunteers. For reference, the Haynes Motor Museum has 20 full-time employees and about 80 volunteers. Obviously, the latter don’t work everyday e.g. Jez told us that he is in the museum once a week. The volunteers engage with the visitors, answer their questions, show them around. They sometimes clean the cars, sometimes do some car maintenance or obviously some TikToks. Jez used to work in car design but now is retired, so it makes perfect sense for him to volunteer in the Haynes Museum. I wish we had this in Hungary.
We started in the first room with Jez – it is dedicated to John Haynes, and here’s a little recap as I promised earlier: he was the first one who made car manuals for everyday people, so that they could fix their own cars. I think that is really cool and it is weird that nobody thought of doing this before him. He started this as kind of a hobby, but it turned into a business, in which his wife helped him and they ended up making a lot of money, so that was why he could also have a car collection as well. Based on what he did, I think it is obvious that he was a person that wanted to share his love of cars and that was how his museum came to be.
Going around the collection with Jez, my absolute favorite was the Red Room (if you are a Marvel fan, turn that part of your brain off now!) – where all cars are red. It is explained that this way the viewer can look past the color and concentrate on the design elements more. The descriptions also explain the power of red, the emotions associated with it and a bunch of interesting facts about the color.
There is also an American cars section that was also close to my heart – especially that you can go up to a mezzanine where the motorcycles are and see it all from above. The turquoise Mustang was a beauty that I didn’t expect to see that day, and was obviously love at first sight. I also came across a time-machine that I have never seen before (a silver Delorean).
In the Ferrari room, I felt right at home, though my favorite, the F40 was missing from the collection. The next room is a garage built up as if it was still used by Haynes. In the motorsport section, you can see Hamilton’s first Formula car – and it is actually the only one that exists.
My second favorite room was the Williams exhibition – there were 5 Williams cars from different eras (actually only 4, one was missing), with beautiful aesthetics built up around them. In the cinema room, a short movie ran about the history of the team, and I have to admit I have teared up a bit at that. Some general facts were also shared about the regulations of the sport and also about the greatest Williams drivers. I loved it!
The British brands section houses some really nice Aston Martins (as a newly turned Aston fan, I took a lot of pictures), and the “Wheels around the World” exhibition expanded our horizons a little bit with some interesting cars (but no spoilers here, you will have to go and see for yourself!)
It was a lovely experience and I am happy to report that the gift shop is also top notch. They not only have a booklet about the whole museum, they also sell postcards with paintings of their cars. I have gotten 3 of these, because I couldn’t pick just one. They also have T-shirts, mugs, and a bunch of really cool things. I could have spent all my money, but fortunately the limited capacity of my backpack prevented a crazy shopping spree.
It is a nice place to visit if you are in the area and even if you are not a petrolhead. I have proof of this: you might have noticed that I kept saying “we” – it is because I was with my friend Anna, who has zero interest in cars and even she enjoyed it (the red room was also claimed to be her favorite).
At the end, I want to say thank you for the opportunity to the museum and also to Jez, who made the whole experience a lot nicer and a lot more personal! If you visit ANY museum in England, make sure you talk to the volunteers, and they will make your visit 10 times better.
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