New Range Rover Claims Major Design Award

Bennett  Oghifo

New Range Rover has triumphed in the Car Design News annual Car Design Review book, claiming the coveted Production Car of the Year award.

Chosen by a panel of expert jurors – including design leaders from Polestar, Lamborghini, Volvo and Lucid – New Range Rover was praised for its reductive design and the way it combines a modern luxury aesthetic with an iconic form that links the new vehicle to its unrivalled 50-year lineage, the automaker said in a statement.

The fifth-generation Range Rover was the clear winner among the shortlisted vehicles, all of which were launched between April 2021 and September 2022.

“Range Rover is the original luxury SUV and a vehicle of peerless distinction. New Range Rover’s exceptional form embodies modern luxury, and its elegant proportions and optimised volumes are hallmarks of our Reductive Design philosophy. This approach was introduced with the Velar in 2017 and is now familiar across our Range Rover family,” said Chief Creative Officer, Jaguar Land Rover, Prof Gerry Mcgovern Obe

New Range Rover is clean and elegant, with seamless laser-welded roof joints, flush glazing and innovative hidden waist finishers where the door panels meet the window glass. The floating roof graphic is a key part of Range Rover DNA while its familiar split tailgate features hidden shut lines which communicate a new level of precision.

Built on the new mixed-metal flexible Modular Longitudinal Architecture (MLA) with a range of electrified powertrains and a drag coefficient of only 0.30 – the lowest of any luxury SUV – New Range Rover was hailed as “simple, bold and the most elegant luxury SUV” by judge SangYup Lee, Senior Vice President and Head of the Hyundai Global Design Centre.

New Range Rover was also praised by fellow judge Maximilian Missoni, Head of Design at Polestar, who said: “For someone who knows what a challenge maintaining purity throughout the process can be, this car and its creators have my full respect.”

The Range Rover SV and Defender teams were also recognised in the Car Design News People Awards, where they were jointly presented with the accolade of Best CMF Team. The Colour, Materials and Finish teams claimed the award for the innovative use of materials and colour to create strong, clear aesthetics that unify the exterior and interior designs of their vehicles.

Further recognition came as Jaguar Land Rover designer Ken (Yujian) Gan received the Undiscovered Talent Award for his exceptional work. Gan, a Masters’ graduate in Automotive and Transport Design from Coventry University, claimed the title ahead of four other exciting young designers.

The multiple award-winning New Range Rover is priced from £99,375 OTR in the UK.