Rolls-Royce’s first-ever SUV (it insists instead that it’s a ‘high-sided vehicle’) is now only hours away from its online reveal.
The company has confirmed it will be seen for the first time at midday on Thursday 10 May.
Rolls-Royce has also given us a glimpse of the first production element in the form of the rear light. Instantly recognisable from the new Cullinan’s stately stablemates, aside from the sharp graphics and typical Rolls-Royce branding, the image does confirm that the new Cullinan won’t entirely give up on the traditional three-box shape associated with Rolls-Royce for over a century.
Known as the Cullinan, both officially, and unofficially for quite some time, Rolls-Royce says its new SUV will redefine luxury travel, and bills the Cullinan as ‘effortless, everywhere’.
True to that billing, the car has been spotted undergoing testing across tougher terrain than you’d expect of regular Rolls-Royce models – and the company’s latest officially released images depict the car doing things you’d more commonly associate with a Range Rover.
The Cullinan’s development programme has seen it tested on roads all over the world, including hot-weather testing in Africa and the Middle East, winter testing in the Arctic Circle and a predictable spell at the Nürburgring Nordschleife in Germany to ensure it’s as capable at speed as on rougher terrain.
And Rolls-Royce certainly isn’t being modest in calling its latest production car the Cullinan. It’s named after the largest flawless uncut diamond ever found, in 1905, at over 3000 carats and over 600g.
The Cullinan car will be a weighty one, too, though Rolls-Royce has attempted to mitigate weight gain, building the car on a new aluminium platform, with a new suspension system and all-wheel drive giving the required mix of comfort and ability.
With an estimated price tag of around $400,000, it’ll become the most expensive production SUV on sale, though rather more affordable than the diamond with which it shares a name (Cullinan 1, the first cut diamond from the original rough diamond, is worth somewhere north of $400m.
Time will tell whether the car’s boxy styling becomes easier on the eye, but given the success of the Range Rover’s increasing push for luxury and the emergence of other high-end SUVs over the last few years, it’s hard not to imagine the Cullinan will also find its place in the market.
This article originally appeared at evo.co.uk
Copyright © evo UK, Dennis Publishing
