What do the Royal Albert Hall’s organist, a Grammy-nominated cellist and Sister Bliss from Faithless have in common? The answer is a unique Bentley. The three female professional musicians – Anna Lapwood MBE, Tina Guo and Ayala Bentovim (Sister Bliss) — collaborated last International Women’s Day to design an Extraordinary Women edition of the Bentley Continental GT Convertible, which has now been crafted by the marque’s Mulliner bespoke division, and is here, ready to be driven by Vogue on the Road.
Bentley says the car is not just a celebration of female musicians, but rather a wider tribute to female collaboration, empowerment, creativity and leadership, hence the Extraordinary Women badge. Music, from its legacy to its current cultural and aesthetic impact, are in evidence everywhere on the car, however. There is a silver plaque on the cupholder lid with the signatures of all three women on it and a Spotify code; zap it and their playlist for the Bentley will appear.
At the rear, the quilted leather cover concealing the furled roof is deep blue, with a sono wave pattern stitched in pillar box red. There are more sound wave patterns picked out in leather in the doors, and the sound system is Bang and Olufsen rather than traditional Naim, so the musicians could customise the gold-anodised speaker grilles. But the true show stopper has to be the 24-carat gold ventilation buttons in the shape of organ stops, to open and close the vents.
Courtesy of Bentley
Blue, red and gold form the colour palette inside and out. The matt exterior paintwork is peacock satin, with a tornado red pinstripe along its flanks and wing mirrors. Inside, the seats comprise a split of Imperial Blue and Gold leathers with accents in pillarbox red and Gold through the stitching and headrest embroidered badges.
The pinnacle of the interior, for those less bothered about musical references and more interested in mind-boggling history, is the material running the length of the Bentley’s dashboard. It’s called “copper stone” which fails to tell the magnificence of this substance: it is in fact a 0.1mm-thick layer of 200-million year old stone (yes you read that correctly), sourced from India. It’s resin-bound onto a flexible glass fibre cloth, and then used like a wood veneer. It’s not lacquered, allowing the natural texture of the stone surface to remain. It looks and feels entirely other-worldly. These are the lengths than Bentley goes to in sourcing new materials that match the zeitgeist but don’t deviate from integrity, passion and sustainability.
Where best to take such a beautiful car and its playlist of dance music and classical? The pressure was on. We were tempted simply to rock up outside the Albert Hall and sit there until someone commented on the gold organ-stop ventilation buttons. But it might have been a while, and the point of a Continental GT is to go somewhere to stretch its legs.
We haven’t even mentioned the fact this is a plug-in hybrid grand tourer, with up to 51 miles of electric driving alongside its V8 engine, making it the most fuel-efficient Bentley and cheapest to run if you have a home charger and are strict with yourself about recharging at night. We haven’t pointed out its power either, which is impressive – it has 671 horsepower which sweeps you up the road like you are as light as a feather (and this car is anything but).
So we decided on a very British weekend country tour, with some musical references thrown in. We started with a morning blast through the Sussex and Surrey countryside to Guildford, to Anderton’s Music Company, a fantastic instrument shop, to buy a Fursch acoustic guitar for my son, from his musician grandfather’s inheritance. Furch is a Czech company which defied the 1970s Communist regime to craft incredible guitars, and when the Velvet Revolution and the fall of Communism happened, Fursch reached the international stage, becoming a favourite of singers such as Suzanne Vega.
An hour later, with our precious new Furch strapped into the equally precious Bentley’s small rear seats, we set off for Tunbridge Wells, James Taylor and Joni Mitchell strumming away on the B&O stereo, each guitar string so delicately picked out by the speakers. We briefly had the roof down to let the early-spring sun in, then realised how easy it would be for someone to nick the guitar from the back seat, so raised it back up swiftly (you can activate it at up to 30mph).
Courtesy of Bentley
In the evening, heated seats and steering wheel on, we did put the roof down to drive to a baroque candlelit concert at King Charles the Martyr, a Grade I listed, 17th-century building in the historic Pantiles area of Tunbridge Wells. There is always something magical about driving a convertible with the roof down at night: the smells and sounds of the evening drift into the warmth of the cabin as you pilot the GT gently through town. With the Continental GT in silent electric mode, you can hear every clink of glass and ripple of laughter coming from bars.
Inspired by the musical landscape the Bentley had thrust us into for the weekend, we booked tickets on a whim for the following night to a Kiki Dee concert in the church of a delicate little village, Frant, perched on a hill nearby. We parked opposite the village’s large cricket green, which felt utterly apt for this scion of British luxury, and walked away from the car just as the church bells struck up. That you Bentley, and thank you to three extraordinary women, for a pitch-perfect weekend.
The car: Bentley Continental GT Convertible
- Price: £220,600
- Engine: V8 petrol and electric battery
- Features: 200-million-year-old stone veneer, 24-carat gold ventilation buttons, Apple CarPlay, convertible, revolving touchscreen, heated seats, parking cameras.