While Daniel Craig’s James Bond showed a predilection for Aston Martins throughout his decade-spanning run as 007—especially the classic DB5, which appeared in four of his five movies—the actor’s real-life automotive interests appear to be more rugged than those of the posh superspy he portrayed.
Case in point: a 1959 Land Rover Series II owned by Craig and his wife, Academy Award-winning actress Rachel Weisz, is currently up for auction at Bring a Trailer. The couple even included a signed portrait and handwritten note with the vehicle, presumably for verification purposes: “This is to say that this beautiful Land Rover Defender was ours. We sell it with great sadness. Please take care of it.”
Craig can be forgiven for calling it a Defender, but his vehicle technically predates the name by over 30 years—the Land Rover Defender only came to exist in 1990 to distinguish the utilitarian 4×4 from the family-oriented Land Rover Discovery. Nevertheless, what’s now called the Defender is the direct descendant of the OG Land Rovers, a pristine example of which is the formerly Craig-owned vehicle.
The Series II, launched in April 1958 for Land Rover’s tenth anniversary, essentially refined the stark, almost militaristic vehicle into the iconic off-road ride that stormed the civilian market in subsequent decades. David Bache, who later designed the Range Rover, was tasked with softening the shape, so he added curved “barrel sides” that hide the wider track, creating a shoulder line that runs the length of the body. Remarkably, those same design elements persisted through the Defender’s discontinuation and its relaunch in 2019.
Craig’s is a Series II 109, indicating the longer 109-inch wheelbase that underpinned Land Rover pickups, the hard-top van, and even a 12-seat station wagon. It runs a 2.25-liter inline-four that was factory rated at 77 horsepower and 124 pound-feet of torque—service records note that the engine was upgraded with a Carter carburetor and an electronic ignition system. The body was repainted Bronze Green and fitted with a canvas Exmoor Trim bed cover, a grille-mounted horseshoe, a rope winch, and fender-mounted side mirrors.
Inside, there are three-across bench seating trimmed in tan upholstery and three-point outboard seat belts, flow-through dash vents, and sliding windows. The three-spoke banjo-style steering wheel fronts Jaeger instrumentation consisting of a 75-mph speedometer and a combination fuel gauge and ammeter. The five-digit odometer shows 3,800 miles, but true mileage is unknown.
With less than 24 hours left on the auction, bidding sits at $39,000. A concours worthy example of the exact same vehicle is valued at $71,600, per Hagerty. Based solely on condition—there are visible dings, scratches, and scuffs in the photos—this one won’t get there. But factoring in Craig’s ownership, anything is possible in the final hours of BAT bidding.