2017 Bentley Flying Spur

The Flying Spur is Bentley's four-door grand tourer, and this second generation is the one that dropped the Continental name from the model entirely - a signal from Crewe that it was to be judged as its own car rather than as a sedan derived from the coupe. The V8 S sits above the standard V8, with more power and a firmer, more responsive chassis calibration. It is the version aimed squarely at the owner who does the driving rather than the owner who sits in the back, without giving up anything in the rear compartment for the times when the roles reverse.

What made this example worth taking is the coherence of how it was ordered. It is black on black on black - the paint, the hide, the wheels, and the lamp lenses all darkened, with the exterior brightwork deliberately taken out of the equation years before Bentley began offering that treatment as a factory package. The rest of the specification follows the same logic and goes to the things an owner actually experiences: the audio, the roof, the driving aids, and the small hand-finished details inside and under the hood. The verified appointments are detailed in full below.

It is finished in Beluga Solid over a Beluga interior - Bentley's deep, unmetallic black, which on a car of this length reads as formal and slightly sinister rather than merely dark. At 23,560 miles across eight years it has been used sparingly and shows the kind of history we look for in a car of this weight and complexity: driven regularly enough to stay healthy, never hard enough to be worn out.