Rolls-Royce Nightingale is a $5 million limited-edition EV, and it's already sold out

In the rarefied satellite of luxury automobiles, Rolls-Royce (BMW.DE) conscionable upped the ante.

Enter the Nightingale, the inaugural introduction successful the automaker’s caller Coachbuild Collection. It combines the nostalgia and expansive motoring of monolithic onshore yachts of the past with drop-top motoring and 21st-century engineering. And we’re not talking astir a V12 — the Nightingale is all-electric.

Rolls-Royce tends to beryllium discreet, shall we say, astir pricing, uncovering treatment of outgo unmannerly. That being said, manufacture sources accidental the Nightingale’s terms tag volition beryllium successful the eye-watering $4 cardinal to $5 cardinal range, depending connected options.

This puts it successful a class of its own, filling what CEO Chris Brownridge describes arsenic a “gap” betwixt the brand’s modular portfolio and its unsocial commissions similar the Boat Tail — a wholly custom, client-commissioned car that Rolls produced lone 3 versions of and outgo $28 million.

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“Project Nightingale is the archetypal Coachbuild Collection,” Brownridge explained from the Rolls-Royce Private Office successful New York. “We designed the centrifugal car, and we enactment with the clients to curate their peculiar coachbuilt centrifugal car ... It’s a existent collector peculiar Rolls-Royce.”

Clients travel to the Rolls-Royce Private Office, alternatively than the dealership, to spec retired peculiar builds similar the Nightingale. Think of Private Office much similar a cushy lounge oregon club, with a comfy surviving room, bar, and a mahogany-trimmed “office” country featuring leather samples and mini overgarment swatches successful a myriad of colors, each molded similar Rolls-Royce vehicles.

And the Nightingale volition beryllium exclusive — lone 100 examples volition beryllium created worldwide, disposable by invitation only. Despite the staggering terms and the displacement to an all-electric drivetrain, the postulation is already sold out. Brownridge said the institution is seeing an “acceleration successful request for much analyzable commissions.”

Project Nightingale is built connected the aluminum spaceframe (dubbed “architecture of luxury”) and powered by a afloat electric, dual-motor powertrain. For immoderate traditionalists, the determination distant from the V12 motor mightiness beryllium jarring, but for the Nightingale’s people audience, EV powerfulness is astir preferred.

The powertrain prime was “obvious” for a car of this stature, Brownridge said. “Can you ideate driving specified an elaborate and extravagant centrifugal car successful implicit silence? Absolutely nary mechanical sound with the extortion down,” helium said, describing the acquisition arsenic akin to “traveling by sailing yacht.”

The engineering takes vantage of the EV layout to refine the car’s “monolithic” aesthetic. Without the request for ample cooling intakes, designers achieved uninterrupted expanses of surfacing connected the beforehand wings. The effect is simply a astir 20-foot-long, two-seat convertible that feels similar a singular artifact of stainless steel, flowing to the elongated yet contoured rear end.