A 100-year-old Bentley was among the last of the incredible items to be transferred from across the UK to a storage facility near Swindon. 

For months the Science Museum Group has been moving items of significance to the Science and Innovation Park and collection management facility located at the former airfield in Wroughton.

Eventually, the facility will be opened up to the public so that people can see the amazing things contained within, which now includes the century-old car. 

The historic car was moved from its former home in west London to the 545-acre site on Monday, March 4.

A spokesperson for the Science Museum Group said: "We moved the Red Label Bentley 3 Litre Touring Car – which is marking its 100th birthday with a new home.

"The 90-horsepower car was manufactured by Bentley Motors Ltd. in 1924. The car has a four-cylinder, water-cooled engine and a four-speed gearbox, controlled by a right-hand gate change."

After the First World War, there were very few cars available for private use as almost no new cars had been built since 1914 and the small number of second-hand ones were expensive and lacked power.

It was against this backdrop that W O Bentley designed his first car, the 3-litre Bentley, in 1919. Bentley wanted to create a reliable, quiet, comfortable and fast sports car. With Bentley Motors as a leading manufacturer, the 1920s were the heyday of the vintage sports car.

The spokesperson added: "The complex work to prepare the collection for the move has been ongoing for several years: studying, photographing, digitising, updating records, conserving and packing the objects at Blythe House in London ahead of their move.

"Back in 2018 just 5 per cent of our objects had a photograph published online. Thanks to this programme that figure is around 50 per cent today – representing more than 200,000 objects – with hundreds of new photographs, insights, and records added online each month.

"Over 380,000 historic objects can now be viewed through our online collection."

Two hundred large historic objects are already housed elsewhere on site – including historic fire engines, a 5m tall Glasgow tramcar and a record-breaking balloon gondola used to study the stratosphere – are being moved into the new facility.

"Public tours, school and research visits will start later this year which will make thousands of incredible items from the collection accessible to the public for the first time," the spokesperson said.

"This is exciting for local audiences, who will have an internationally significant and publicly-accessible collection on their doorstep."