Ladies and gentlemen, behold the new Rolls-Royce Cullinan.
That's just never gonna get old, is it?
Now we call this an SUV. Rolls-Royce call it a high-bodied vehicle.
You can call it whatever the hell you like.
First impressions, well, it's quite large, isn't it?
Yeah, about the same length as the standard wheelbase Phantom,
but obviously a lot higher.
We've got the air suspension here in its highest setting: maximum effect.
and I have to say I quite like it.
Might come back to bite me, that one,
but basically, this thing does what it says in the tin.
It's unmistakably a Rolls-Royce. It's got a bit of Phantom DNA in there,
and it's all been carefully moulded into the shape of a massive off-roader.
Now we should probably get the techie bits out of the way first,
so we can go and have a play in the back.
Under there, we've got the same aluminium scalable architecture
that you get with the Phantom,
but actually, that's the platform that's gonna underpin all future Rolls-Royces,
so the next Wraith, the next Ghost.
What it means is this shares the Phantom's four-wheels theory.
It also gets the same 6.75-litre twin-turbo V12
with over 650 horsepower and plenty of torque.
Most importantly though, this car gets four-wheel-drive,
so if you have a look down here,
you'll notice 22- inch wheels.
There's also quite a lot of ground clearance
and quite a lot of suspension travel.
That's because Rolls-Royce didn't want this car to be just a jacked-up Phantom.
It had to be a proper off-roader,
so whether the owners were charging across their polo field
or cruising across the Serengeti
and, by the way, these real things that happen in the lives of Rolls-Royce owners.
Well, it had to be just as effortless as every other product they've ever made.
Right, so if you come around the back, there's two things I want to point out.
The first is this little notch back here.
It's what Rolls-Royce designers call the bustle,
and supposedly it mimics the fact that in the olden days,
Rolls Royces would have a trunk latched to the back of them
with leather straps.
Designers, ey?
Anyway, the other bit is this.
It's the rear tailgate. This thing is a hatchback.
The first series Rolls-Royce to ever have a hatch,
and it gets better because if I open this up and then open this,
it's got a proper split tailgate,
and all you country folk out there will know that it's absolutely vital
to have one of these to put your wellies on.
There is a slight fault, though, which I'll demonstrate now.
You can't stand fully up in it, because this thing overhangs,
which means you can't get the prime viewing spot at the horse-racing
unless of course you're a five-year-old child.
Rolls-Royce does make up for it, though,
because you can have two modules
that you click into the back.
The first is basically a big box with a load of custom drawers inside it,
so whether you're a fisherman or you like photography or you like hunting,
it can all be customized to your needs.
The second is something called the viewing suite.
Now I'm told this is two leather chairs
that when you open the tailgate deploy out the back
complete with a cocktail table in the middle.
The idea is that when you back this thing up
to the edge of the Grand Canyon,
you can sit back in utter luxury with your other half,
drinking a cocktail and admiring the view.
I think that's called winning at life.
Right. The interior it is beautiful, of course,
but if I hit this button here, yes, you see all my instrument dial lights up,
so we've got physical dials but a digital background,
and in the middle, a flap lifts up to reveal my infotainment screen,
but before we get to all that, I want to talk about the stance,
because from where I'm sitting, it's quite an extraordinary view,
just looking right down that bonnet.
In the Phantom, you already sat above the traffic,
because its wings are just so massive. In this thing,
well, you tower above them.
What I need to show you is the off-road mode,
so basically, you hit a button here and you get three choices.
The first is uneven firm terrain, so gravel.
The next one slippery loose terrain, so wet grass basically.
And the last one very soft loose terrain, so basically nasty mud, deep snow or sand.
Quite literally then, Rolls-Royce isn't mucking about.
Right. Now the first thing to mention while I wait for my door to close itself
is the fact that there are no plans for an extended wheelbase version
of the Cullinan, but seeing as I have roughly 42 feet of legroom here,
I don't think that's going to be much of a problem.
You'll notice up here, we don't have the Starlight headliner
with all its twinkly lights. Instead we have a panoramic glass roof.
Now you can choose between the two.
There's also a choice down here,
because this one is the bench seat.
It's the family-friendly Rolls-Royce.
For the selfish people out there,
well, you can have two individual rear seats,
but yeah, this is for the family man that has everything.
Even got little zips down here with ISOFIX mounting points.
They've really thought of everything in here.
If you're late for the board meeting, hit this button
and your table and screen deploy,
so you can catch up with your emails
or they've got a clever new screen mirroring function,
so say you've got a TV show or a film on your phone or iPad
where you can just shoot it wirelessly to this screen and keep your kids quiet.
I could get used to this.
So, time to answer the really big question.
How much for the Roller?
Well, we don't have an exact price yet,
but what we do know is that it sits somewhere between
the Ghost and the Phantom.
Now the Phantom starts at around 360 grand,
the Ghost at a bit over 200 grand.
So I'm going to hedge my bets here
and say the Cullinan will cost around 300,000 pounds.
That's a lot of money, sure, but come on. It's a lot of car.