As Gerry McGovern’s time at JLR appears to be up, it’s worth reflecting on the challenges faced by car designers. There are the intangibles, of course, questions of taste and brand identity - not to mention the structural limitations of adhering not just to safety regulations but also an engineer’s whims - all of it eventually boiling down to the removal of a bedsheet on a show stand, followed by instant judgement from people who couldn’t draw you a cricket bat.
When you get it right, you’re a hero. But get it wrong and walls close in really fast. Gerry got it right many times. In fact, if we credit him with the Evoque - arguably as close to a genuine clean-sheet design as Land Rover has been in the last 25 years - it might even be fair to say he caused the car world to shift on its axis. Had his compact SUV not been quite so terrifically striking, perhaps it wouldn’t have sold in quite such prodigious volume, thereby kicking off an upmarket segment land grab that continues to this day.
At any rate, Gerry’s success demonstrated (not for the first time, of course) that if you got the styling right - right in a way that made your rivals look dingy and unimaginative - the customers would likely follow. The version of TVR that flourished under Peter Wheeler had well learned that lesson two decades earlier. The launch of the sublime Griffith in 1990 heralded an unbroken streak of steroidal sports cars that might not have ever been bettered: the Chimaera, Cerbera, Tuscan, Tamora and T350 all leaving an indelible mark on adolescent minds.
But before any of that, there was the White Elephant. Built in 1988, as TVR and Wheeler groped for a direction away from so many wedges, the prototype was an attempt to soften and smooth out its '80s obsession with a tapering straight edge. Hence the vaguely futuristic vibe given off by the flush headlight glass and space-age back end. It screams design exercise, yet the car was no empty box: upfront it received an experimental Holden-built 5.0-litre V8 destined for racing Commodores; underneath, there was an SEAC chassis.
In other words, it was perfectly drivable - and drive it Peter Wheeler did, for as many as 27k miles according to the seller. Doubtless it helped that the bespoke interior had been specifically crafted for his 6ft 6in frame, and even included a half-moon shape cut out in the back for his dog. However, despite the creature comforts, the concept eventually fell out of regular use as the firm went down the path that led to the Griffith and everything that followed. The White Elephant ended up in TVR’s graveyard, facing oblivion.
Happily, just before the business was sold to Smolensky in 2004, the rotting corpse was acquired by a TVR superfan, who removed the tree growing from its loading bay and the mice from its rocker covers, and spent nine years restoring it. After twenty eventful years of running it, the car was sold to its current owner, who has brought it up to snuff ahead of offering it for sale to the wider public, effectively for the first time. It hardly needs saying that you’ll need not only deep pockets to keep in fine fettle, but also a huge soft spot for TVR in general. After all, the firm would promptly go on to make far better-looking and more famous cars that can be bought more cheaply. But the White Elephant’s storied imperfections are what make it special. It didn’t change the world. It just makes you happier to be in it.
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