To add a subtle, elegant shimmer, the team developed a brand-new technique for applying pigment to the clearcoat – a process that took several months, including over 3,000 hours of testing. To achieve this effect, the marque’s darkest solid-black paint is overlaid with a finish incorporating a mirror-like pigment, selected for its colour-shifting properties. Iridescent in sunlight, it reveals purple, blue, magenta and gold undertones when viewed at different angles. As the creation is unveiled to us, the first thing that strikes me is the unusual, shimmering and one-off Liquid Noir exterior finish. The curtain is about to be raised on a creation Rolls-Royce hails as “the most ambitious, singular and highly Bespoke Phantom we have every created” – according to CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös – formally vowing that it will never be replicated.īased on the Phantom Extended, the ultimate blank canvas for Bespoke commissions, Syntopia was created for a client who is passionate about fashion – and that’s about all Rolls-Royce is prepared to reveal about the car’s owner. Like the collection, which comprises a series of highly sculptural garments brought to life through movement, Phantom Syntopia seeks to represent the elusive, ethereal beauty of fluid motion in solid materials through its Weaving Water theme. Phantom Syntopia takes its name from the Dutch designer’s landmark 2018 collection, designed on the principles of biomimicry in which art is inspired by patterns and shapes found in nature. Admittedly, I feel a little starstruck at the prospect of meeting a fashion designer whose work I have long admired, and excited to witness the result of two luxury houses closely collaborating to push the boundaries of innovation, craftsmanship and luxury. The finishing touches to Syntopia were done just days earlier, and we are among the very first to behold this one-of-a-kind creation. The Phantom Syntopia’s one-off Liquid Noir exterior finish reveals purple, blue, magenta and gold undertones when viewed at different angles Only a handful of editors from around the world have been invited for a privileged sneak preview of Phantom Syntopia, the most technically complex Bespoke Phantom ever produced – in the presence of couturière Iris van Herpen herself, who spent the past three years working with the Rolls-Royce’s Bespoke Collective team on the project. Surrounded by 42 acres of southern England’s lush and verdant scenery, the contemporary low-rise buildings – designed by venerated British architect Sir Nicholas Grimshaw – and perfectly coiffed trees lining the entrance, a combined exercise in geometry itself, give away some clues of the extraordinary world that unfolds inside. It’s a typical grey, English-weather-kind-of-day with a slight drizzle when my chauffeur-driven Black Badge Ghost pulls in at the inner sanctum of Rolls-Royce in Goodwood, West Sussex. If there was ever any doubt that the word ‘impossible’ does not exist in the vocabulary of Rolls-Royce Bespoke, Phantom Syntopia, the haute couture-inspired masterpiece, forever diminishes that notion.
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