• A one-of-one Continental GTC S, inspired by surfing and exclusively for China, makes its public debut, having already been sold
•Bentley Batur, the exquisite Mulliner Coachbuilt two-seat grand tourer, is unveiled for the first time in a new exterior colour by Mulliner, Gloss Aquamarine, with new design DNA showing direction for future Bentleys
•Luxury flagship Bentayga EWB Mulliner displayed together with Flying Spur Azure Hybrid, demonstrating stunning bespoke features
•In 2024, Bentley will offer special collections inspired by Chinese culture, meeting the personalisation demands of Chinese customers
Bentley Motors presents a number of models all crafted by Bentley's personal commissioning division, Mulliner, at Auto China 2024. A one-of-one Continental GTC S, exclusively created for China, makes its public debut in Beijing, having already been sold. The exceptional Mulliner Coachbuilt project – Bentley Batur – makes its first public appearance in China with a new exterior paint colour, presenting a striking new look. The Bentayga EWB Mulliner – Bentley's luxury flagship, is also displayed at the luxury stand alongside the Flying Spur Azure Hybrid, demonstrating stunning bespoke features.
Also announced, are the design details of the special collections inspired by Chinese culture. All of these models showcase Bentley's ultimate luxury personalisation, defining the extraordinary benchmark for contemporary luxury mobility and lifestyle.
'As the world's oldest coachbuilder whose origins date back to the 16th century, the Mulliner name is known among Bentley cars for its ultimate luxury personalisation,' said Ansar Ali, Mulliner and Motorsport Director at Bentley Motors, 'we're delighted to see that customers' interest in luxury personalisation peaked in 2023, rising by 43 per cent from the previous year, with three quarters of Bentley customers exploring the 46 billion different personalisation configurations available from our options range to add personal bespoke content from Bentley's Mulliner division. Our discerning Chinese customers and the luxury market here continue to inspire and push us to explore new boundaries, so we are excited and motivated by the future opportunities in this market.'
'In China, twice as many of our customers are choosing Bentley's personal commissioning services through the Mulliner division as opposed to two years ago, a clear sign of the desire for truly unique commissions and exclusivity by our Chinese customers,' said Kim Airey, Managing Director of Bentley Motors Chinese Mainland, Hong Kong and Macao. 'To further reinforce the importance of Mulliner personalisation in China, Bentley will offer a number of China-exclusive personalised collections co-created with Mulliner in 2024. The extraordinary cars are inspired by our Chinese customers and dealers, and the perfect synthesis of Mulliner's craft, capabilities, and local culture,' Airey added.
Mulliner Coachbuilt: The ultimate personal commission
Mulliner Coachbuilt cars combine an incredibly wide range of rare artisanal skills, modern sustainable design, and cutting-edge engineering and innovation to deliver a service no other car manufacturer can match – creating truly wondrous coachbuilt Bentleys.
Limited to just 18 cars, the coachbuilt Batur is the most powerful Bentley ever, a two-seat grand tourer only Mulliner could create. It is also characterised by a new, minimalist design language that sets the stage for the future style of Bentley models. The Batur displayed at Bentley's stand presents, for the first time, a new exterior colour by Mulliner, Gloss Aquamarine. The stunning looking car perfectly echoes the inspiration for its name – a beautiful body of water, Lake Batur.
The new design principles create a stronger and bolder exterior for the Batur that simultaneously remains elegant and graceful, relying more heavily on curvaceous surfaces bisected in the right places to reflect light and dark and bring increased muscle to the design. It looks fast even when stationary. This special feature – the 'endless bonnet' – makes the car long and lean and gives an elongated proportion to the front end. The line stretches from the bonnet along the whole length of the car, and highlights the cleaner shape. Meanwhile, the visual mass of the car is moved rearwards, giving the impression that the car is sitting on the rear axle, which adds further depth to the haunches. The famous Bentley grille is redesigned to be lower and more upright, giving the car a stronger face and a more dominant stance. The grille is flanked by a new headlight shape and design, bringing self-confidence with a luxury stance.
Any part of the Bentley Batur model can be customised in colour and surface finish. Endless samples of unique materials bring texture to the process, and the resulting designs will be truly individual and created by the customer – limited only by their imagination.
Batur has a two-seat interior space, with every element of its cabin tailored to the customer's specifications. Clients can choose from a variety of sustainable interior materials. Mulliner's in-house design team combined luxury materials and unique surfaces, giving this model a special personality. The use of 3D printed 18K gold, sustainable leather and veneers in Natural Fibre composite lays a solid foundation for the Mulliner to achieve its sustainability goals.
Mulliner Bespoke: Create something unique
Mulliner Bespoke offers a limitless range of stunning bespoke finishes and features, from interior speciality veneers and precious metals to a light illuminated to the ground displaying your design, which can make your Bentley truly unique and personal.
Bentley Motors unveiled the latest bespoke masterpiece from Mulliner at Auto China 2024, which is a one-of-one Continental GT Convertible S, exclusively created for the Chinese market. Its design – interior and exterior – is inspired by one of the most popular adrenalin-filled sports in the world – surfing – and it perfectly embodies the young spirit and aspiration of Chinese customers today.
The Snow Quartz exterior paint is a palette that pays homage to the natural colours of ocean waves, complimented by the Light Celeste pinstripe on the Mirror Cap Housings. The cabin design is inspired by 'Green Room', referring to the stable room inside the wave, the ultimate goal of every surfer. The interior is finished in Light Celeste as the main hide and complemented by Beluga as the secondary hide together with a Dual Gradient Single Finish Veneer featuring Brunel over Light Celeste, a Piano Brunel centre console with hand painted Light Celeste chevron pinstripe, and the contrast S emblems in Brunel have been embroidered on the headrests, reminding us of summer surfing.
The Flying Spur Azure Hybrid also shares the luxury stand, presenting various bespoke personalisation details in the cabin, including Galaxy Stone over Imperial Blue Dual Finished Veneer. Bentley's team of expert veneer hunters went to extraordinary lengths to select the stone veneer, showcasing a fusion of century-old craftsmanship and advanced technologies. This results in variations in colour, pattern, and texture which are almost impossible to imitate. Bentley's revolutionary stone veneer interior finish makes for a magnificent contemporary feature of natural products formed over 200 million years ago.
Bentley also unveils three China-exclusive personalised collections co-created with Mulliner at Auto China 2024. The limited collections are inspired by Chinese culture, and will be launched in 2024. Limited to a production of 8 cars, Koi Carp Collection is inspired by Koi Carp, which expresses good wishes for auspiciousness and prosperity in Chinese culture. Six unique Koi Carps are included in the interior design with different shapes on backrests and the inner sill plate respectively, 'swimming' clockwise to circle the occupants in the luxury cabin. Also limited to a production of 8 cars, Landscapes Collection is inspired by a famous ancient Chinese painting 'A Thousand Li of Rivers and Mountains (?????)', which depicts the vast country landscape, such as rivers and hills, representing Chinese people's responsibility to the home and their nation. The contrast bespoke landscape embroidered emblems on the backrest subtly represent the shape of the Chinese characters 'Rivers and Mountains (??)'. The Ru Yi Collection is limited to the production of 3 cars, its design concept is inspired by Chinese traditional Ru Yi, which is usually owned by ancient nobles and symbolises power and good fortune. The backrests are decorated with Ru Yi embroidery in gold, and is the first time Mulliner has embroidered a Chinese calligrapher's writing seal script character in the interior design. The 'Ru Yi (??)' seal characters are presented in the exterior badge, treadplate, and passenger fascia, adding dynamic and powerful features to the models.
Curated by Mulliner: Explore endless possibilities
From special finishes and colour schemes to beautifully crafted interior and exterior features, Curated by Mulliner offers flexible personalisation options, allowing Bentley customers to customise based on their preferences and experience the sense of achievement and joy of creating a masterpiece with their own hands.
Bentley's luxury flagship Bentayga EWB Mulliner, showcased at Auto China, offers more cabin space than any comparable luxury competitor and its bespoke enhancements make every journey an occasion to be savoured. The experience from the driver's seat is equally as special as that of the expansive rear cabin, providing the world's most luxurious SUV thus far. For cabin customisation, there are eight three-colour combinations to choose from, curated by the Mulliner Design team, which is a Mulliner design signature and only available for Bentley's pinnacle models. Customers can also specify their own Mulliner Bespoke Interior using any three colours, producing nearly 4,000 tri-tone interior colour combinations. The show car on the stand presents a Bespoke Interior Colour Split using Linen as the main hide with Imperial Blue as the secondary hide and a Camel accent colour. To further demonstrate Mulliner's personalisation capabilities, a bespoke and unique front-to-rear colour split separates the rear seats from the front, flowing from Imperial Blue in the front to Linen by the rear seats.
Photo credit: Bentley posted on conceptcarz.com
