seen in such ostentatious vehicles. Rolls will be glad it isn’t launching a new Phantom now, but this new Ghost will be a much easier sell. The Ghost takes many of the Phantom’s stand-out styling cues – particularly the theatrical, rear-hinged, ‘suicide’ rear doors – and incorporates them into a gorgeous but more subtle shape. It’s still a very large car at 5.4 metres in length but it disguises its bulk well. Inside, the cabin is also a little more conventional-looking than the Phantom’s but no less well-executed. The materials used are of a quality beyond what you’d expect to find in a mere car. The leather is so soft and supple it is almost oily to the touch. There is thick, flawless chrome, piano-black gloss veneers, glass switches and solid, fat nuggets of aluminium; the quality and precision here is best compared to bespoke furniture or a sporting gun.
DRIVING RANGE
An English Gent HK Golfer car editor Ben Oliver slides behind the wheel of the new Rolls Royce Ghost and really doesn’t want to leave
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he new Rolls-Royce Ghost won’t have quite the same impact as the bigger Phantom did when it first appeared in 2003. That car was a staggering statement of intent from BMW, which had just taken over the fabled British marque and built it a new home – factory is too base a word – in the grounds of The Earl of March’s Goodwood House in Sussex. The Phantom is an extraordinary piece of automotive architecture; its prow is as proud, bluff and upright as the white cliffs of Dover, and the engineering beneath is just as impressive. It is eye-wateringly expensive, but worth every cent; it redefined the luxury car, and made it abundantly clear that the new generation of Rolls-Royces would be far more than simply rebadged, reskinned BMWs. As anyone who has seen one of the Peninsula Hotel’s fleet of Phantoms can attest, witnessing one on the street is an event. 16
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H av i n g u s e d t h e Ph a nt o m a n d t h e subsequent coupe and convertible spin-offs to re-establish Rolls-Royce as an automotive nonpareil, the company is only now beginning to expand its range with a more affordable model. At around two-thirds the price of the Phantom, depending on specification and local taxes, the new Ghost still sits well above range-topping Mercedes and BMWs. But it is smaller and less arrogant than the Phantom, intended as a car for owners to drive themselves, and which they’d feel comfortable parking on a city street. Design work began long before the financial crisis, but this the ideal new model for our times. With Rolls-Royce’s Asia-Pacific sales doubling in the first quarter of 2010 by comparison with the same period last year, buyers are plainly prepared to buy luxury cars again. But even if they can afford them, many don’t want to be HKGOLFER.COM
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SCORECARD How much? Engine: Transmission: Performance: How heavy?
HK$4.8 million 6592cc twin-turbo V12, 563bhp@5250rpm, 575lb ft @1500rpm 8-speed automatic 4.9sec 0-100kph, 250kph (limited) 2435kgs
And there’s wit, creativity and intelligence in the design too. As well as the age-old RollsRoyce features like the Spirit of Ecstasy mascot, the violin-key switches and the ‘power reserve’ gauge in place of a rev counter, there are new ideas to surprise and delight. An umbrella is hidden in each front door. The RR logos in the wheel centres are weighted and rotate independently of the wheels so they’re always the right way up, and the elegant typeface used on the gauges and switches was designed in the 1920s by the artist Eric Gill, who lived in the
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village of Ditchling, not far from the new factory and a subtle nod to the car’s Sussex origins. Under that long hood lies a 6.6-litre, BMWderived, twin-turbocharged V12 engine. Its colossal 563 horsepower is enough to fling this heavy car to 100kph in just 4.9 seconds, as fast as a serious sports car. But the refinement is somehow more impressive than the pace; at town speeds the Ghost is ghostly, sighing from light to light in the near-silence we’ve come to expect from electric cars. Under hard acceleration the sound doesn’t quite match the picture; the horizon comes rushing at you, but from the engine comes only a distant, cultured burble, the automatic gearbox changing up through its astonishing eight ratios utterly seamlessly. And of course, the Ghost rides serenely, its air springs constantly analysing the road conditions and the driver’s intentions to produce either cloud-like insulation from Hong Kong’s occasionally cratered tarmac, or level, composed handling when the speeds rise and the bends sharpen. Few cars achieve this duality of character. Of course, the Ghost makes no pretence of being ‘sporting’, but instead leaves you to be surprised at how sporting it can be when required. Criticisms? Very few. We’re not abandoning our journalistic objectivity here; some cars are just right first time. The Phantom was a perfect example, and having taken seven years over the next distinct model in the new Rolls-Royce range, BMW was always unlikely to produce a car to lesser standards. Rolls-Royce famously acquired the ‘best car in the world’ moniker in the 1920s. Social and environmental pressures and the very high standards of more affordable cars mean a Rolls is unlikely to win that tag again. But the Ghost comes as close as a superluxury car can.
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