First production Lagonda teased
Not content with revealing an old/new Aston, Gaydon has hinted at Lagonda's future too
Even the most cursory overview of this year's Geneva show would have told you that Aston's plans are of the most ambitious sort. Not content with launching a new Vantage, the firm also chose to resuscitate its long dormant luxury brand, Lagonda - and not merely as a differently-shaped adjunct to its other offerings, but as a cutting-edge, all-electric marque in its own right.
To give this idea credence, it showed the Vision Concept in Switzerland, a swooping, out-there show car meant to embody ideas rather than production reality. Now Gaydon has taken the next step, and delivered us a hint of what the first Lagonda off the line will look like in 2021.
And guess what? It's an SUV. Now, let's not get too bogged down in that fact. Should the 114-year-old brand be building a follow-up to William Towns' wedge? Of course it should - but the brand wants to rival the Rolls-Royce Cullinan and Bentley Bentayga right out of the gate, and we can't blame it for that. Super-luxury SUVs are definitely going to be a thing, more so than they are already.
And while it is arguably treading an already well-worn path in segment terms, Aston is adamant that the Lagonda will be quite unlike anything else currently on offer. "It will be like no other SUV to drive," commented Chief Creative Officer, Marek Reichman, "so its looks have to reflect that new reality and to serve as pathfinder to a future in which the most desirable and prestigious automobiles still have a place.'
Those looks - in sketch formate at least - indicate that the radical design language suggested by the concept will be carried through into production reality, as will the zero-emission powertrain technology currently being developed to drive the Lagonda brand (a feature that is rather easier to package in an SUV than it is in a ground-hugging saloon car).
"In reviving one of the most iconic names in motoring we have created a unique opportunity," said Aston Martin CEO, Andy Palmer. 'One that allows us to cast aside an inherited 20th century approach and instead design cars around 21st century demands and desires. The Lagonda SUV is the first of its kind: a spacious, high-performance 4x4 that successfully reconciles a love of technology, luxury and style.'
Relaunching Lagonda is enough of a stretch but these designs are like Gerry Anderson's 1960's vision of 2021. The Aston Martin Lagonda of the 70's and early 80's was a terrible car in nearly every way - except in having some hand in saving the company from bankruptcy. Updating it's ridiculously idiosyncratic design language for a new era of cars is a complete nonsense but seems to inform much of the recent design thinking for the brand. If ever anything was going to be seen as Aston Martin hubris it's the distraction of a separate saloon and SUV brand and the pretence that Lagonda meant or means anything to anyone (except fantasists who have never driven or owned a Towns' wedge Lagonda or the very small number of die-hard fans).
Relaunching Lagonda is enough of a stretch but these designs are like Gerry Anderson's 1960's vision of 2021. The Aston Martin Lagonda of the 70's and early 80's was a terrible car in nearly every way - except in having some hand in saving the company from bankruptcy. Updating it's ridiculously idiosyncratic design language for a new era of cars is a complete nonsense but seems to inform much of the recent design thinking for the brand. If ever anything was going to be seen as Aston Martin hubris it's the distraction of a separate saloon and SUV brand and the pretence that Lagonda meant or means anything to anyone (except fantasists who have never driven or owned a Towns' wedge Lagonda or the very small number of die-hard fans).
https://www.astonmartin.com/en/cars/taraf
https://www.astonmartin.com/en/cars/taraf
But come on PH, you're reporting on something that is two months out of date.
That:
"Super-luxury SUVs are definitely going to be a thing, more so than they are already."
is not journalism. That's souping up a press release with zero added value, one that was extraordinarily lame to begin with.
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