After much teasing with the 100EX concept, here it is at last, the first new Rolls-Royce since the Phantom was launched in 2003 and the first convertible Rolls since the old Corniche ceased production some time ago.
It's called the Phantom Drophead Coupe and is based on the same all-aluminium chassis as the four-door, and uses its wonderful 6.75-litre V12 engine. Like the Phantom, it has rear-hinged doors which Rolls-Royce likes to refer to as Carriage Doors and the same sumptuous interior, swathed in hand-finished wood and leather.
The bonnet is available in brushed steel and the rear 'deck' can be had, appropriately, in solid teak. Apparently, if you specify the teak, oiling the wood becomes a standard procedure at the service intervals.
Don't assume that the patrician Rolls grille and teak decking means that it'll feel like a yacht to drive though. We've driven the Phantom saloon and that handles and drives like a car one quarter of its size, so the shorter, "less formal" as Rolls likes to put it, Drophead should be even better again to drive. Expect an Irish price in the region of €600-€650,000 (a snip!), alhtough the first one off the production line has already been sold, for charity, for $2,000,000, with the money going to the Naples charity for underpriviliged children.
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