Lagonda: much longer

500bhp, giant-wheeled crossover concept heralds a shift upmarket for beleaguered Peugeot

Aston revives classic badge for very LWB, very pricey four-door. Saudi princes cheer

This is a message to the world,” says Peugeot’s director of product and strategy Xavier Peugeot (yes, he’s a descendant of the founding family). He’s talking about the Quartz, his firm’s 500bhp hybrid off-road coupe concept.

That message is that Peugeot is aiming upmarket. “We need ‘boosters’, either dedicated products [like the RCZ] or versions of the mainstream cars [like the 208GTI and soon the 308R],” says Xavier.

With those halo cars in place, the whole range can head north. We’re not talking Audi prices here, but Pug does want to lift itself clear of the middle-market morass, its lunch being eaten by the likes of Kia. “Buyers are splitting away from the middle-market,” says Xavier. “They want distinctiveness. People are expert.”

No question the Quartz is distinctive. But let’s not get all overexcited: the production crossover this previews won’t quite mirror this 500bhp, scissor-doored, coupe-backed, 23-inch-wheeled badass. For a start, though the official spiel mentions that the 308 platform underpins this concept, that’s stretching the truth, because the Quartz is far too wide.

“An SUV coupe concept has to talk loud,” says design boss Gilles Vidal. “This is hyper-expressive, a caricature. To build it, we’d have to go back to buyable proportions.”

But it isn’t just an early alert about Pug’s crossover plans. “It’s about explaining an evolution of our form language and the front end of Peugeots. You can see the nose of our SR1 concept on production cars now. We’re experimenting with the next step. This form language is potential for the whole brand.”

They’ve identified two strands for future top-end Pugs, says Xavier. One will be the sporty ones, featuring lightweight materials and high-tech lighting.

The other is dubbed ‘sustainable premium’ and uses natural materials that wear with age – worn leather, denim cloth, untreated woods, bamboo. Versions were shown in the Onyx, with its copper skin and compressed-newspaper dash. Potential buyers, says Xavier, are willing to pay extra for highly efficient powertrains. Sounds to us a bit like the range-extender BMW i3 and its recycled cabin materials…