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A few weeks ago, I told you about the relaunch of the Jaguar brand and its unique Type 00 concept car.
I still think the advertisement was a practical joke gone horribly wrong, but now that Jag has unveiled the Type 00 and we can see more than snippets of the design… I can honestly say I’m intrigued.
The Jaguar Type 00
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It’s big, bold and aggressive, but it’s also not a horrible departure from automotive form.
There have been worse concept cars. Way worse.
In 1990, Chrysler visited upon us the Plymouth Voyager concept. Think of it as the love child of an 18-wheeler and a Pontiac Transport.
The Plymouth Voyager
In 1991, BMW gave us the E1. Looks like a Honda CRX had some misfortune between the jaws of a rather large vise.
In 1999, Honda gave us the Fuja-jo, a two-person sauna on wheels.
Not to be outdone by the Subaru Brat, Toyota offered up the Toyota Celica Cruising in 1999. Yes, a late-90s Celica with seats in a pickup bed at the back.
Toyota Celica Cruising
Citroën gave us the Karin at the 1980 Paris Motor Show. Picture an AMC Pacer made of wax that had been left out to melt in the hot sun.
Citroën’s Karin
None of the above made it to production. Thankfully.
Back to the Type 00: it’s a modern, some might say too modern, reflection of one of the most beautiful cars in automotive history, the Jaguar E-Type. It has a long hood (or bonnet, in Britspeak) and cab-rearward design that’s sleek and sporty.
There are some odd bits: since Jag is evolving to an EV maker, what is with the long hood? Previously, hoods were stretched that much to hide long V-12 gas engines, but even a super powerful electric motor and battery configuration doesn’t need that much space.
At the back, there’s no rear window: presumably, the idea is a camera that sends video to a screen where the rear-view mirror goes. The flat face of the car seems to run counter to aerodynamics, instead of slipping through the air, the Type 00 seems to be pushing a box of tissue paper. Still, the shape of the hood and rearward slope of the rear fascia do conform to the ideals of minimizing air drag.
Reinventing the logos, such as ditching the jaguar’s head for the wheel caps and almost hiding the leaper (a jaguar in side profile) in a series of slots low on the sides of the vehicle, are most likely a mistake. Jag’s leaper was to it like the Flying Lady is to Rolls Royce.
And let’s not mention the typographic headaches the new Jaguar brandmark — lowercase on everything except the G — will give magazines and ad directors.
In one journalist’s walkaround of the car, presented Dec. 3 in Miami, the journalist likened the concept car, with no apparent hints of sarcasm, to the marriage of a Rolls Royce Spectre and a Tesla Cybertruck. That’s a union no one, ever, has lusted after, but it seems on reflection to be a bit unfair to Rolls and to Jag.
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