It’s a wonder that it’s taken Ineos this long to arrive at the concept of a limited edition Grenadier. The square-jawed off-roader is a chip off the old Defender block, after all, and Land Rover is a past master when it comes to the business of sprinkling a car with easy-win confetti. Some of these were legitimately brilliant, of course (the Heritage, the V8-powered 70th Anniversary) some less so (Tomb Raider, anyone?) but with a peerless lineage and what seemed like a million years of production, it had plenty of inspiration to call upon.
Ineos, which has been a car company for about three minutes, has had to work a bit harder. In fact, it has swerved around the issue of its own age by observing someone else’s: the limited edition Grenadier is called the 1924 to celebrate the first 100 years of British clothing firm, Belstaff. Why, exactly? Well, devotees will doubtless recall that a tie-up has existed since day one, and that the model’s Trialmaster and Fieldmaster trim levels are based on Belstaff jackets. Plus Ineos has owned Belstaff since 2017. So there’s that, too.
Anyhoo, the brand was founded a century ago, so today we get 1,924 examples (obvs) of the Grenadier in a ‘contrasting colour palette of Magic Mushroom and Inky Black, [with] exclusive gloss black diamond-cut 17-inch two-tone alloy wheels and a dechromed black grille trim with front and rear skid plates in dark grey.’ It actually looks pretty good from where we’re sitting, although you might find yourself searching for the ‘distinctive Belstaff centenary badging’ in vain; Ineos has limited these to just a couple of places and made them no bigger than a book of stamps.
Things get no more conspicuous inside, where you’ll find a dark green finish set against black saddle leather trim, but will need to look up to clock the Belstaff logo on the overhead panel. Or get a passenger to read out the unique production number from the tiny plaque in front of them. Shouty, it isn’t. And nor is it going to be any different to drive, clearly. Although, in fairness, with a hydrogen prototype doing the rounds and the electrified Ineos Fusilier inbound, the manufacturer can point to significant advancements it is making elsewhere on that score. The Grenadier 1924 is more about confetti. Order books open on June 26th.
1 / 10