2016 Lagonda Taraf Review: The $1 Million Hand-Built Sedan by Aston Martin

According to our colleagues at Hodinkee, the ultimate watch-junkie website, the Richard Mille RM 56-02 Tourbillon Sapphire costs $2,020,000, not the least because it takes almost 1,000 hours to mill and polish the three parts for its case from solid sapphire. The sapphire bridges take another 400 hours to make, and the movement is suspended by a gorgeously tiny and intricate cable-and-pulley system first pioneered by the RM 27-01 watch made for tennis superstar Rafael Nadal. Only 10 will be made.

The RM 56-02 tells you the time of day, just like a $75 Swatch.

You need to know the Richard Mille RM 56-02 exists to understand the Lagonda Taraf. This $1 million sedan, hand-built by Aston Martin, costs more than five times as much as a Mercedes-Maybach S600. Yet it matters little to the people who will buy the Taraf that the Maybach is technically the more accomplished ultra-luxury sedan. When you can afford to drop a couple of million bucks on a watch, spending half that on a gorgeous, handmade, ultra-exclusive fashion accessory you can drive—or be driven in—seems like a no-brainer.

The 2016 Lagonda Taraf is built on the aluminum-intensive VH architecture that underpins the Aston Martin DB9 coupe and the Rapide sedan. In simple terms it’s a Rapide with a 7.9-inch wheelbase stretch and more formal roofline, clad in unique carbon-fiber body panels.

Under the hood is a 540-hp version of the 6.0-liter V-12 that dates back to 1999 and the glory days of Ford-era Aston Martin. Starting life—conceptually, at least—as a couple of Ford Duratec 3.0-liter V-6s joined together, the Aston V-12 is still built in a bespoke facility at Ford’s Niehl engine plant in Cologne, Germany. Connected via a torque tube to an eight-speed ZF automatic transmission mounted between the rear wheels, the engine develops peak power at 6,650 rpm and peak torque of 465 lb/ft at 5,500 rpm.

With all the DB9 and Rapide hardware underneath, the Taraf, not unexpectedly, drives a bit like an Aston Martin stretch limo. It’s not an ultra-luxury car—the steering’s too lively, the engine’s too vocal, the ride’s too firm, and there’s too much road noise. On the flip side, though, the big Lagonda is more fun to hustle down a back road than a car its size ought to be. The powertrain doesn’t feel quite as crisp as it does in a DB9, but it still delivers that wonderfully elastic, almost turbine-like surge of power so characteristic of a V-12. Through the twisties the Taraf turns in nicely and grips well, with minimal roll, and the long wheelbase damps fore-aft pitching.

The Taraf’s interior is familiar Aston Martin fare, right down to the near-illegible instruments, console-mounted push-button transmission controls, and the faintly Rube Goldberg infotainment interface that belies the HDD sat-nav system and 1,000-watt Bang & Olufsen BeoSound audio system.

There’s a ton of legroom in the rear seat, as you’d expect in a car that’s almost as long as a Rolls-Royce Phantom, though that torque-tube and rear-mounted transmission means the Taraf is strictly a four-seater. Of course, being an Aston Martin—and because it’s hand-built in the same corner of Aston’s Gaydon factory where the One-77 supercar was assembled—the Taraf interior can be finished in almost any combination of leather, wood, carbon fiber, or metal a customer desires.

Originally intended only for the Middle East, barely 40 Tarafs have been built so far. New Aston CEO Andy Palmer authorized a remedial engineering program to get the car the meet European and low-volume vehicle U.S. import regulations, but even so, no more than 200 will be built.

Though the guys at Aston Martin claim a 0-60-mph time of about 4.4 seconds and a top speed of just over 195 mph, the Lagonda Taraf is one of those cars that will do its best work idling up to the front door of the Savoy or the Beverly Hills Hotel or the Burj Al Arab, its ice-cool elegance cutting a swath through the swarm of Bentleys and Benzes. It’s the ultra-lux sedan for the man who has everything.

2016 Lagonda Taraf by Aston Martin
BASE PRICE	$1,000,000 (est)
VEHICLE LAYOUT	Front-engine, RWD, 4-pass, 4-door sedan
ENGINE	6.0L/540-hp/465-lb/ft, DOHC 48-valve V-12
TRANSMISSION	8-speed auto
CURB WEIGHT	4387 lb (mfr est)
WHEELBASE	125.6 in
LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT	212.5 in x 75.5 in x 54.7 in
0-60 MPH	4.4 sec (mfr est)
EPA CITY/HWY/COMB	N/A
ENERGY CONSUMPTION	N/A
ON SALE IN U.S	Now

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Aston Martin, Arab sheiks, and the Ohio connection

Founded in 1906, Lagonda made its reputation in the 1920s and ’30s building fast, sporty touring and two-seater cars with four-cylinder engines and, later, six-cylinder engines of up to 4.5 liters.

Though a Lagonda won the Le Mans 24 Hour race in 1935, success on the track wasn’t enough to forestall a looming bankruptcy. Lagonda’s new owner, Alan Good, who outbid Rolls-Royce for the company, also brought in W.O. Bentley, who designed a new chassis and a 4.5-liter V-12 engine that debuted in 1938.

After World War II, Bentley designed a new, smaller car powered by a 2.6-liter, twin-cam six-cylinder engine, but postwar steel rationing meant the company wasn’t able to get it into production, and Lagonda was sold to industrialist David Brown, who merged it with Aston Martin in 1948.

Under Brown, fewer than 800 Lagondas were built between 1949 and 1958. More important, though, Bentley’s 2.6-liter engine ended up powering the Aston Martin DB2 and, bored out to 3.0 liters, the DB2/4.

The Lagonda name reappeared in 1961 on the 4.0-liter Rapide sedan, which was basically a four-door Aston Martin DB4. Just 55 were made through 1964. A decade later came the Lagonda V8, this time a four-door version of the Aston Martin DBS V8. Only seven were ever built.

Having been sold by David Brown in 1972, Aston Martin Lagonda was sold again in 1975, and the new owners had ambitious plans for the Lagonda brand. They commissioned British designer William Towns, who had styled the Aston DBS V8, to design a radical, sheer-surfaced, wedge-shaped sedan. Unveiled at the 1976 London Motor Show, this astoundingly futuristic Lagonda featured a fully digital instrument panel made up of three cathode ray tubes—effectively three mini-TVs. But Aston Martin Lagonda’s ambition outstripped its expertise, and the Lagonda sedan was bedeviled with electronic glitches and other quality problems.

The first car was finally delivered in 1979, and 631 were eventually sold, many to wealthy Arab sheiks, before production ended in 1990. The Taraf is this car’s spiritual successor.

And the Ohio connection? Lagonda is the Shawnee name for the Buck Creek area near Springfield, Ohio, hometown of Wilbur Gunn, the Scottish-American engineer who founded the automaker.

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