Bentley’s new flagship is a massive yet stately battering ram of an automobile that oh-so-politely says, “I am very important. Please do get out of my way.”
Nothing about the Mulsanne is subtle, from the 505-horsepower twin-turbo V8 propelling the behemoth to the optional 21-inch wheels carrying it. The Mulsanne almost makes a Cadillac Escalade on dubs look understated. This is a car that no more than a few thousand people will ever buy, and as such it provides the utmost luxury — and lets everyone know it.
“This car is obviously a statement,” Christophe Georges, the company’s president and chief operating officer, told Wired.com during a sneak-peek in San Francisco before the car was unveiled today at the Frankfurt auto show. “We want this car to be the pinnacle of Bentley.”
“Car” seems too plebeian for something that takes nine weeks to build and almost certainly costs more than $350,000.
Although Bentley remains a British company that has built cars in Crewe since W.O. Bentley spun wrenches, it is owned by Volkswagen. You can see Teutonic influence in the styling, which is muscular and athletic. The Mulsanne looks like it was milled from billet. It is huge, almost 219 inches long and 76 inches wide, but more graceful than the Rolls-Royce Phantom and Maybach 57. Bentley hasn’t said what the Mulsanne weighs, but the Arnage is just shy of three tons.
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