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Aston Martin Lagonda Vision Concept re-envisioned as zero-emissions luxury brand

After introducing the hand-built, limited-edition, one-million-dollar Lagonda Taraf saloon in 2015, Aston Martin is again reaching to its Lagonda heritage dating back to 1904. But while there's a new saloon concept to be presented, Lagonda has completely changed around it. The Taraf had a six-liter, 540-horsepower V12 under its hood: the new car has no engine and no hood. Instead, Aston Martin is turning Lagonda into what it calls the first zero emission luxury brand. The herald of the newly born Lagonda is the Vision Concept, and it showcases the design language Aston Martin is preparing for a 2023 launch. While Astons still embrace the internal combustion engine, the letter "O" in Lagonda's logo is re-purposed to stand for zero emissions. As per Aston's statement: "With no need to package a vast internal combustion engine, gearbox and transmission, Lagonda's designers could optimize the interior down to the smallest detail and then build up the exterior of the car around it. The Lagonda Vision Concept doesn't have a bonnet because one is not required." The production Lagonda is to be fully autonomous "on all routine circumstances and all recognizable roads." This means the steering wheel can freely move from the left side of the car to the right, or retract completely. Choosing to not do the driving isn't alien to Lagonda customers, as Aston Martin's Andy Palmer explains. "For owners of true luxury cars, autonomy has existed for over a century, in a carbon-based form called a chauffeur." He adds, "We imagine most Lagonda customers will choose to be driven, but whether by a person or a computer will be up to them. And if they want to drive themselves, the car will ensure that is a delightful and memorable experience too. Lagonda will provide that choice." The tall, airy cabin has been designed with the help of Savile Row tailors, and the armchair-like seats can be arranged to face each other. The seats aren't mounted on runners, but cantilevered arms. As for range, Lagondas will have been engineered for a real-world 400-mile range with solid-state batteries. There's "intelligent all-wheel-drive," with any wheel able to be given 100 percent of the available torque.

Aston Martin DBX Luggage Test | Is there actually U in Aston's SUV?

Does it really matter how much stuff can fit in the cargo area of an Aston Martin? Yes! The brand has forever been known as the purveyor of GT cars, those intended specifically for grand touring over some significant distance where bringing along some stuff is likely. Two suitcases at the minimum, I'd say, with a decent amount of space inside for odds, ends, purses and/or little dogs. Good luck doing that in an Audi R8.  The Aston Martin DBX is an extension of that concept, admittedly to an extreme degree. Your tour is going to be so grand that you'll need even more stuff or have a bigger dog or need to bring the kids along or need to travel some distance over a rugged road. I like to think of it as a family GT car.  So, how family friendly is it? Well, the vast wheelbase provides a stunning amount of back seat space. I could easily fit my son's enormous Britax Boulevard rear-facing car seat and still have more than enough room for all 6-foot-3 of me to sit comfortably in the front passenger seat. I didn't even need to put it that far forward. That's rare. I've had to move up minivan front seats. Does the Aston Martin DBX have space for a rear-facing car seat? pic.twitter.com/RRYNN4O0li — Autoblog (@therealautoblog) February 13, 2022 But I'm here to talk cargo capacity, which is officially listed at 22.3 cubic-feet behind the back seat. I can tell you right now that's deceptive — there's far more than that would imply. Aston Martin, much like Mercedes-Benz, Porsche and perhaps Land Rover, must be using a different measurement than most in the industry. A capacity of 22.3 cubic-feet would be in the midcompact SUV range, in between a Mazda CX-30 and Kia Seltos. I can definitively say it has more space than those. In fact, it has more space than compact luxury SUVs like the Genesis GV70, which is listed at 28.9. I would not be surprised if it would be in the low 30s if Aston Martin used a different measurement. You're not going to find may cargo areas with nicer carpet than this thing. Having a rubberized floor covering to keep in the garage would be a good idea. Now, like most SUVs, the DBX includes a cargo cover. It certainly isn't normal, though. It's a rigid piece, which is common among hatchbacks and crossover-coupes that have low rooflines that don't really afford much usable space between the cargo cover line and roof. That's not quite the case here.

Aston Martin DBX spied with Mercedes-inspired interior exposed

Aston is out doing performance testing on its new SUV, the DBX. One of our spy photographers caught it running around the Nurburgring a short while ago, and now we have sound to go along with it. There are also a few shots of the interior that show off some of Mercedes' contributions to the crossover. If we had to guess, we'd say Mercedes-AMG is also providing the loud beast hiding underneath the hood, too. In listening to the DBX pounding around the Ring, it sounds a whole lot like the 4.0-liter twin-turbo V8 found in all the extra-hot AMG vehicles, from the AMG GT to the GLC 63. It's a guttural, nasty sound we've grown accustomed to out of these vehicles, and now that Aston is already using this engine for the DB11 and V8 Vantage, it's no stretch to think they'd use it again. The interior features a lot of Mercedes switchgear upon close inspection. It's impossible to confirm, but the font, menus and layout of the infotainment system look a whole lot like MBUX. Then the array of climate controls, rotary knob and buttons around it look just like the stuff out of a modern Mercedes. If you zoom way in on the key sitting in the dash, we can even see a little of what might be a three-pointed star on it. At any rate, the key is identical to what new Mercedes keys look like today. Moving on to the steering wheel, we see the exact same setup as what's on the spokes of pretty much every Mercedes equipped with MBUX. Everything down to the symbols and black touch-sensitive buttons show up here. It's important to remember this vehicle is still a prototype, so things could change. As for the exterior, we don't get to see anything new there beyond what Aston officially released awhile back. It's still wearing all the same camouflage, touting sponsors/suppliers to go along with the same zany green, yellow and red look. Aston has previously said the DBX will be officially revealed before the end of this year, and we'll expect it to go on sale in 2020.