2013 Bentley Continental Flying Spur on 2040-cars

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Bentley Mulliner Bacalar is so bespoke, it's a whole different car

Bentley talks a lot about “bespoke” — the customized elements done at the hands of its Mulliner division — but the newly unveiled Bentley Mulliner Bacalar takes the idea to a new level. This isnÂ’t just a unique paint color or a special upholstery fabric or a fabricated housing for an ownerÂ’s pet ferret. ItÂ’s a completely custom-bodied automobile, one that transforms the Continental GT convertible into a restyled two-seat roofless barchetta, which takes its name from a lake in MexicoÂ’s Yucatan Peninsula. Bentley claims that not a single exterior body panel from the Continental GT remains unchanged on the Bacalar, and the design is said to be inspired by last yearÂ’s EXP 100 GT concept. That show car was a coupe with scissor doors and an electric powertrain. The Bacalar is none of those things. But you can see some rub-off from the EXP 100 GT in the detailing, such as the horizontal lighting elements at the front and the rear. This example wears special Yellow Flame paint that incorporates the ash from burned rice husks as a more environmentally friendly way to create a metallic effect. In the Bentley Mulliner Bacalar, the doors and fenders are made from carbon fiber, while the clamshell covering over the rear compartment is aluminum. The body panels feature additional air intakes, a double hump behind the front seats, and more pronounced rear haunches over the 20-mm wider rear track. There is no roof — presumably owners will drive one of their dozens of other cars if rain is predicted. It would be a shame, after all, to let this interior get wet. The BacalarÂ’s cabin has just two seats, with a carved-out luggage hold behind each one that is specially designed to fit custom-matched bags made by Italian luggage maker Shedoni. The reworked center console angles up to meet the dash, which contains BentleyÂ’s Rotating Display and a digital instrument cluster that differs from that of production Bentleys. The seats are upholstered in British wool together with two types of leather, and the wool elements also appear on the console and door panels. The wood trim — in both matte and gloss finishes — is sourced from 5,000-year-old trees harvested from rivers, lakes and peat bogs. The 6.0-liter twin-turbocharged W-12 engine is massaged to the tune of 650 horsepower and 667 lb-ft of torque (versus 626 ponies and 664 lb-ft in the Conti GT). The W-12 is paired with an eight-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission and rear-biased all-wheel drive.

2012 Pebble Beach Concept Car Lawn offers a tutorial in cars to come

The Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance is a showcase for some of the world's most exquisite vintage vehicles, but if newer metal is more your speed, the Concept Car Lawn is the place to be.
This year saw models from Bugatti, Lamborghini, Aston Martin, McLaren and Bentley as well as SRT, Hennessey, Infiniti and Lexus among others. The ultimate sampler platter of exotic and concept vehicles saw the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport Vitesse mingle with the Lamborghini Urus Concept and the mighty Hennessey Venom GT, though we found ourselves particularly smitten with the BMW Zagato Roadster and the Aston Martin Vanquish.
Not that we could go wrong anywhere we looked. The 2013 Bentley Continental GT Speed seemed perfectly content parked on the manicured putting green, as did the McLaren MP4-12C Spider. Get cozy with the full gallery below to see the smattering of metal on the lawn.

Behold my hideous Bentley!

Do you all just love my hideous Bentley? It's so insane and tacky. I'm sure if I were to actually order this a British lord somewhere would dispatch his valet to slap me.  Who knows where I'll figuratively be in two weeks' time, but today turns out to be the day I turned to see just how tacky certain car configurators will let you get. Admittedly, they're almost all high-dollar, extra-low-volume cars. If you try to play around on a Honda configurator, you'll have wrapped things up in about 30 seconds.  But Bentley, now that's a company that'll let you get tacky on its configurator. I chose the new Continental GT Convertible because the lowered roof would make it easy to demonstrate in pictures the level of my tackiness. From there, it was this eye-searing Apple Green, though I was certainly tempted by Azure Purple and Magenta. Roof choice? I was expecting there to be more, nevertheless, Claret red seemed like a suitably awful pairing.  Inside, well, let's crack those knuckles and get to work. Luckily, Bentley lets you choose two different leather colors: Main and Secondary "hides" with five choices of how to split those colors. Sorry, colours. I chose Colour Split B cause it seemed to have the most of each colour. For the Main Hide, I went with Hotspur, an extremely red shade of red that would be home in an early 2000s BMW. Cumbrian Green and Damson purple were tempting, but they just weren't bright enough, and I thought they wouldn't pair poorly enough with the Secondary Hide: Newmarket Tan, which is pretty damn orange. You can't see it, but the interior of the roof is Blue. For the veneer, I went with Tamo Ash, 'cause yuck. Finally, throw on some black wheels, and voila, my tacky Bentley. I must say, this is most definitely tackier than the real Bentley Flying Spur I once tested that looked like South Beach threw up inside. So much white and teal. Oh, and that ash wood. A Bentley rep told me they ordered it by mistake.  Now, Bentley isn't the only high-dollar outfit that lets you indulge in such tacky fantasies. Most other British brands do, including Mini, and the Germans offer plenty of color choices as well, usually through some special custom program like Audi Exclusive. Porsche makes it especially easy, though, which you can see in my other craptacular creation below.