Gnome superfan in 800 mile round trip to Doncaster to fill his car with 20 figurines

One of Britain’s biggest gnome lovers has revealed to TV viewers how he once made an 800 mile round trip to Doncaster to fill his car with 20 of the garden figurines.
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Dave Robinson, who lives in Cornwall, told This Morning viewers that he once made a 14 hour round trip north to Doncaster to add to his huge collection of garden gnomes, cramming 20 of them into his car for the 400 mile return journey.

Dave, who lives in Hayle, has 240 gnomes in his back garden – and told the ITV show it takes hours to keep them looking spick and span.

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He has slowly built up his collection over the last five years - and admitted it takes five hours to paint and maintain them in one sitting.

Dave Robinson with his gnome collection. (Photo: ITV)Dave Robinson with his gnome collection. (Photo: ITV)
Dave Robinson with his gnome collection. (Photo: ITV)

But despite Dave's passion for the garden gnomes, he admitted to viewers that his partner ‘wasn’t a fan.’

Speaking to presenters Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary, he said: 'It started about five years ago, when the Queen had her jubilee and my dad went into Asda and he noticed they had this giant gnome queen and he came home and told me and I saw it and thought that's cute.

'But our garden was so overgrown [so I thought it would] look terrible in it, but after a couple of days I thought "do you know, one gnome will look nice, maybe two or three".

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'And I went up to get her but she'd sold out so I ended up driving half way around Cornwall and I ended up finding her and a knight and a mother gnome and some children, and then they got a dog and a cat and a granny and grandad and it just sort of built from there.

Discussing the maintenance of his collection, Dave added: 'It's a nightmare, I used to spray them all with this lacquer and it would protect them but because Cornwall's quite sunny at times I started repainting and it can take me around five hours.'

Dave joked he'd soon need a bigger house and added: 'I mean it's an acquired taste so if you can put up with my gnomes then me, well you're onto a winner.”

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