Extraordinary auto
Bentley has unveiled its latest creation, the limited-edition Bentley Mulliner Bacalar.
Photography by Bentley Mulliner
03 March 2020
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Following the cancellation of the Geneva International Motor Show, Bentley Motors held a digital launch from the home of Bentley in Crewe, England 3 March 2020.
Priced from AUD$3 million, the Bentley Mulliner Bacalar is only the second two-seat Bentley since 1930. Exquisitely hand-built by Bentley Mulliner, the oldest coachbuilder in the world, the Bacalar represents Grand Touring at its most exhilarating.
Just 12 units of this striking, limited edition model are being created, guaranteeing rarity and exclusivity, and offering supreme luxury and breath-taking performance.
Bacalar looks to the future of bespoke luxury motoring – each model will be handcrafted in Bentley Mulliner’s workshop in Crewe, according to the individual customer’s personal tastes.
This exceptionally rare car is appropriately named after Laguna Bacalar in Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, a lake renowned for its breath-taking natural beauty, continuing Bentley’s strategy of naming cars after remarkable landmarks which started with Bentayga in 2015.
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A roofless Barchetta design with all-new and highly muscular coachwork, embracing a myriad of options and materials, each Bacalar will be truly unique, the result of direct interaction between the Bentley Mulliner design team and the individual customer.
Adrian Hallmark, Chairman and Chief Executive of Bentley Motors, commented “The Bentley Mulliner Bacalar is our ultimate expression of an open-top, luxury grand tourer, and of the immense capabilities of our team in Crewe.
“In Bacalar, we have created a fully bespoke Bentley, orientated towards a two seat open top experience, and carrying a number of the forward thinking elements of future luxury, first heralded in our EXP100GT as part of our Centenary celebrations last year
“Bacalar is a rare and remarkable Bentley, and whilst clearly defined, will be an extraordinary and collaborative experience for just twelve discerning people who will now co-create, collect, drive and treasure one of 12 being built.
“Our customers are as excited as we are about Bacalar, as it brings our team and discerning enthusiasts together, to create the finest bespoke, hand-built cars, and push the boundaries of our imagination and capabilities.”
Inside Bacalar’s cabin, Bentley craftspeople have created a cockpit like no other. The architecture of the Bacalar has allowed Bentley Mulliner designers to create a ‘wraparound’ cockpit design that not only blends the interior and exterior together but also emphasises the two-seater character.
The wraparound design flows from a steeply angled centre console into the dashboard, before sweeping into the door panels. These then continue towards a uniquely styled, semi-enclosed luggage compartment behind the seats. These two luggage ‘pods’ envelope the seats creating a true two-seater cabin.
With a focus on sustainable design, Bentley has collaborated with carefully selected companies to create the new Bacalar. Each one uses sustainable and innovative techniques that exemplify the best craftsmanship that the world has to offer, in many cases fine-tuned over centuries, and using ethically-sourced materials.
For example, the rare Copper-Infused Riverwood that forms the wrap-around dashboard is a sustainable wood from naturally fallen trees that has been preserved for 5,000 years in peat bogs, lakes and rivers found in the Fenlands of East Anglia, England. This exquisite wood was chosen for its striking black aesthetic, the result of lying untouched in wet earth for thousands of years, and has been air-dried for an extensive period in controlled conditions to preserve its unique natural characteristics.
Bentley Mulliner has also collaborated with a traditional British textile mill to produce bespoke natural wool cloth akin to a fine tailor’s suit.
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