Comedian and UFC commentator Joe Rogan has a podcast that’s bigger than every talk show on television right now. As a result, his long-form show has attracted huge names to speak into the mic. Presidential candidates like Bernie Sanders, celebrity billionaires like Elon Musk, motivational figures like David Goggins, entrenched subject matter experts like Robert Schoch, various UFC fighters, and everything in between. Rogan also likes cars. Muscle cars, specifically. Currently, he parks a 1965 Chevrolet Corvette Sting Ray next to his Tesla P100D, but he also owns a very special vintage SUV: a 1971 Ford Bronco done up by Icon. If you haven’t heard of Icon, they’re an incredibly high-end bespoke restoration brand out of California that started out with old Toyota J40 Land Cruisers. From there came a Ford Bronco program, and several one-off projects like the various Derelict vehicles. The person behind it all is founder Jonathan Ward, and his love for artisanal craftsmanship seems to know zero bounds.
Recently, Joe Rogan had Jonathan Ward on the JRE podcast, and the conversation went everywhere. Below is the two-hour-fifteen-minute video recording, in full:
There’s a fair bit of dialogue regarding secondary interests like watches. But overall the discussion sticks to cars, Icon as a company, and what Jonathan Ward might be cooking up next. He mentions that the original Chevrolet Camaro has been “getting under his skin” lately, and mentioned that the original design team looked at European sports cars of that era for inspiration. Ward cites the Ferrari 275, as one example. The bold summary of such a concept appears to be this: what it look like if the European coach builder made the Chevrolet Camaro instead? What a thought, indeed.
Ward wouldn’t say whether or not if he would start the project any time soon. But we wouldn’t be surprised to see an Icon Chevrolet Camaro at a booth at an upcoming SEMA Show.