The renaissance of the English brands: anything but average

I I'll admit: English cars were for me For a long time as seductive as a cozy evening with Camilla behind damp castle walls in front of a portion of plum pudding. Well, tastes are different, but I would prefer to stick to Pippa, probably the most successful princess sister on earth.

Success - that brings us directly to the topic: the current British cars, or rather, those with British ones Ancestors. Their motto was once: Grace, pace and value for money. Meanwhile imprisoned in a virtual dungeon, Germans, Indians, Malays and of course the British have liberated and implemented it. Honestly, are you interested in who owns a company if the product is convincing?

Rear bend of the Porsche 911 based on the Aston model

The fact is: After the Aston Martin, Jaguar and Land Rover almost fell victim to Ford for years, they are now showing the rest of the automotive world how to maintain an image. Need proof? Even the new Porsche 911, a German shepherd among sports cars, gets a bend in the rear based on the Aston model. Designer Marek Reichman will be grinning and working on the evolution of the grandiose basic shape.

And while a mid-engine speedster at VW dies in endless decision-making stages, lamenting lightweight construction, the Lotus boys from Hethel have with them Elise and Co. have infected thousands with the incredible ease of being. In the beginning they actually drove around with aluminum brake discs, providing thieving pleasure despite the - shall we say - restrained Rover engines and tattered roof.

Average is nothing for British brands

Oh God Rover: First Honda with redesigned Accord and Co., then BMW. What was it? No line, no concept, just average. And if there's one thing British brands can't take, it's average. As Mini proves with its success story. Even the horror stories of Oxford band workers who, out of injured national pride, worked sandwiches and beer bottles into the mini-bodies, deliberately delivered poor quality, do nothing to change that. That's over, the Mini rocks. Because he's different, a guy, someone with variations - even the chubby Countryman is grumbling.

And the next Brit popper is already scratching his tires. The Range Rover Evoque,the hottest UK export since Pippa. Presumably, the VW Tiguan will bring the better standard seating area, the finer handling and price-performance ratio. But the range has something priceless: the urge to want. Palpitations. Style. Skillfully broken down by the style icon Range Rover, which once founded the segment of luxury SUVs.

Jaguar is back at the front

In general, there are some segment founders here: Mini, Lotus, Land Rover. Their Alu-Kraxler, now trading as Defender, has been in use for 63 years - without too much character-weakening interventions. Which brings us to Jaguar. At times stuck on the retro deathbed, the brand is now back at the front. Dry shoots such as the Mondeo clone X-Type cut off, the rest cherished, partly reinvented. So the Jaguar XF can technically hold its own against tough German competition - optically anyway.

Even a four-cylinder diesel is gladly taken from it. And a lasciviously stretched black shiny XK as a business card is perfect. Let the others show off with more coherent infotainment menus or finer handling - when the 5,000 cubic V8 sniffs the horizon, nobody asks about it. Isn't it nice that the days of British misery are over?