The Australian MOTORLIFE Museum

The Australian MOTORLIFE Museum is a not for profit volunteer organisation with Authority to Fund Raise as a Tax Exempt Charity that began in the early 1990’s with a group of veteran and Vintage motoring enthusiasts building the Illawarra Motor Museum with the sole purpose of showcasing the Veteran and Vintage cars to all Australian and international visitors.

With the inclusion of more exhibits there was a need expand so we moved into the new building with a new name to include “Motorlife” which was chosen from an early magazine publication so as to cover not only the main exhibits, the cars, motorcycles and bicycles but also the technology that helped change the face of Australia during the late 1800’s and so you will see a very wide range of exhibits from tools, gramophones, typewriters, scales, telephones and more, with a lot of the exhibits resorted by our volunteers or on loan from members and friends.

The museum houses: The Paul Butler Collection which is the accumulation of many years of collecting a wide range of cars and memorabilia; one person’s passion. The Wayne Gardner Collection of trophies and motorcycles. The NRMA Heritage display. And some fine examples of Australian motoring heritage.

Motorlife has continued to run popular events for the enthusiast over the years such as our Annual Expo on the October Long Weekend, Wheels in Motion on the 2nd Sunday of every month and we are a venue for National Motoring Heritage Day in May.

The Members Room opened by and named in honor of Sir Jack Brabham can be hired for functions with a fully equipped industrial kitchen and bar area. There are also seating nooks in our café area for morning tea, lunch or afternoon tea (bookings required) other facilities include seating on the veranda to enjoy your packed lunch. We are easy walking distance from a BBQ picnic area with full playground all set in a beautiful parkland.

Our visitors can take their time exploring our single storey building with easy access for wheelchairs and full amenities including parent changing room. We allow visitors to take photos and we have a few interesting photo opportunities for our visitors.
The Committee of The Australian MOTORLIFE Museum 


 LIBRARY
The museum has an extensive library consisting ofMagazines: over 21,000 magazines including Autosport, Motorsport, RCN, SCVW, Wheels, Modern Motor, Motor Manual, The Autocar, T&CC, C&SC, Road & Track and many motor bike issues.
Follow the magazine link to access the catalog on magazinecollector.net.
 https://www.magazinecollector.net/@motorlife/

General motoring books - over 2500 books covering all aspects of motoring and motor sport
Follow the Books link to access the catalog on librarything.
​https://www.librarything.com/catalog/Motorlife​​​

Over 5000 items consisting of reference and technical books, parts catalogs, workshop manuals, ephemera, maps, etc
The catalog is accessible in the museum library.

All items are accessible for reference/ research at the museum with prior arrangement.

Any and all donations to the library will be gratefully received.

The library is usually staffed on Mondays and Thursdays. Can be contacted on library@motorlifemuseum.com