The BBC is to air a series of programmes featuring nothing more than former Top Gear host James May taking to pieces and reassembling household objects, after a “slow television” bus tour of the Yorkshire Dales was watched by nearly a million viewers.

James May: The Reassembler, will see the former motoring journalist unscrewing and then rebuilding items including a Flying Scotsman Hornby railway set, a 1960s Kenwood Chef food mixer, and a Dansette – a record player with integrated speakers that dates back to the late 1950s.