THE LUXURY QUOTIENT

P hantom has always laid the marker for luxury in automobiles. What would be talked about the most in the new edition is the “Gallery”. It is a reinterpretation of the car’s unused expanse in the dashboard and instrument panel area. It is like a canvas that can be used to display anything from a painting, a sculpture made of feathers or jewels.

The company has worked with artists, designers and design collectives to demonstrate the kind of creations possible behind the glass of the Gallery. From an oil painting inspired by the South Downs of England in Autumn by renowned Chinese artist Liang Yuanwei, a gold-plated 3D- printed map of an owner’s DNA created by the enfant terrible of German product design Thorsten Franck, a hand-made stem of the finest porcelain roses handmade by world renowned porcelain manufacturer Nymphenberg or an abstract design in silk by British artist Helen Amy Murray, the space can accommodate a lot.

Even with the Gallery, the driver or chauffeur, as the case may be, would be met with driving functions as a digital screen emerges when the engine switches on, rising in the centre and vanishing when off. Then there are the hand-crafted seats. Behind the wood panelling on the rear of the front seats are the Rear Picnic tables and the Rear Theatre monitors, which are electrically deployed and retracted at the touch of a button. Customers can commission different seating choices best suited to their requirements. Also new is the fixed rear centre console that incorporates a drinks cabinet with whisky glasses and decanter, champagne flutes and coolbox.

When it hits the roads in 2018, the new Phantom will join the list of must-haves for the connoisseurs of luxury around the world. ~