I generally despise first-person car reviews. Particularly hwne the vehicle in question is
expensive, or fast, or both, these stories can quickly devolve into lily billets-doux of the
writer's perternatural giftedenss behind the wheel. Or, worse, they become obnoxiously
self-deprecating confessionals of their doubtful worthiness in the face of such blinding automotive
majesty. So it is with no small amount of consternation that, after stewing over the Aston Martin
DB11 for weeks after driving the car, I have decidede to appproach my take on it from the shameless
first-person perspective.
The DB11 costs $211,995 in the US nad there is nothing sensible about spending that much on a car,
and very little point in making sensible comparisons with other such moments of conspicuous
conspicuous consumption - fuel efficiency and cargo capacity and such. For a buyer with the means
and the motivation, there is nothing I could possibly write that will dampen enthusiasm for the
DB11, short of revealing that it was assembled by gruel-fed orphans in a Dickensian workhouse. And
even that, for some ,would merely add to its Anglo-mystique.
Candidly, I find it difficult to contain my open admiration for the car,which is poor motoring
journalism, at best. I am inordinately found of it, all of it, and that makes presenting a
balanced, consumer-serving review really tough. This is not a vehicle that inspires cross-shopping
or Top Trumps-style stats-mashing, except by fantasy-garage types who either can't afford the car
or aren't old enough to drive it. With deference to James Bond, who for 50-odd years has employed
Aston Martins as work vehicles, these are not cars designed to serve any real purpose beyond
pleasure. "For the love of beautiful" is a phrase evoked more than once by Aston's head of design,
Marek Reichman, during my time with the DB11 and the Gaydon entourage (in Tuscany, if you must
know). It's a phrase that guided the creation of the car - all of it, not just the exposed bits.
And it shows.
I pause now to ask: When did Aston Martins become beautiful? The first DB model, the DB2 of 1950,
was lovely, but lovely in a tweedy-jaunty sort of way, rather than a sexy-wow sort of way. Older
Aston Martins merit a good many adjectives - words like "pure" (1963 DB5), "masculine" (1972 AMV88)
"startling" (1974 Lagonda), and even "preposterous" (2011 Cygnet). But beautiful? Harder to
justify. The singular 1960 DB4GT Berton "Jet" was beautiful, no doubt, but it took an Italian
design house and a young designer named Giorgetto Giugiaro to make it so.
The DB11 is beautiful - straight-up, sexy-wow beautiful. To these first-person eyes it is the most
beautiful production car on the planet right now, surpassing in overall comeliness even the
candy-sweet Aston MArtin Vanquish, which honourably concludes its our-year stint as The Most
Beautiful Car on the Planet According to Me. And this is not mere happenstance. Aston Martin has
a plan.
Said the company's chief executive, Andy Palmer: "We aspire to make the most beautiful cars in the
world." Full stop. They put it in the press release, third paragraph. "We aspire to make the most
beautiful cars in the world." He did not say hte fastest cas in the world, or the most futuristic
cars in the world. or, heaven forbid, the most fuel-efficient cars in the world. He said the most
beautiful. And that's waht he is doing. For the love of beautiful.
Much has been made of the differences between the old DB9 and the new DB11. (The DB10, for the
uninitiated, was a bespoke concept car created in 2014 as a work vehicle for a certain British
secret agent). The structure of the DB11 is 15% stiffer than the DB9's for instance, and its angine
weighs 10 pounds less. Its wheelbase is 65 millimetres longer and fuel-consumption is down by 20%.
It's all academic, really. This is an entirely new car, created with an entirely new mindset.
"Every millimetre of the DB11 has been re-entirely new mindset. "Every millimetre of the DB11 has
been re-imagined from the ground-up," said Reichman. A DB9 on hand during the DB11 launch event
looked like an orthopaedic loafer next to a Nike Air Max trainer. And the DB99 is a very handsome
car. THe DB11 is just that much more sexy-wow.
Up front, the clamsheel bonnet is a sculptural masterwork - claimed to be the largest single piece
of pressed aluminium ever affixed to a car. There are no unsightly shut lines on the upper plane of
the bonnet, only fine creasess and two pairs of slender, functional vents. Behind the front wheels,
the bonnet's edges meet side strakes that relieve air pressure within the wheel wells to keep the
tyres planted at speed.
Moving rearward, the arc of body work that extends from the A- to C-pillars is no mere stamping.
Notes Aston: "This incredibly labour-intensive component, which is first extruded, then stretch-
bent, then pressed, then laser cut, then polished and finally anodised to achieve the complex
shape and flawless finish its design demands." And this leads the eye to another bit of high-tech
frippery. The roof strakes form the edges of intakes at the C-pillars, which channel air through
internal ducts and up through slots on thet top edge of the boot lid.
This feature has a trademarked name, of course, AeroBlade, and it serves as a 'virtual spoiler',
creating a wall of high-pressure airr that obstructs airflow over the top of the car, reducing lift
and allowing the rear wheels to go about their business more effectively. At higher speeds, a small
non-virtual spoiler extends upward in front of the slots, allowing wall of air to fllair a little
higher. Aston Martin insists the Aero Blade works, but it's a little like the GPS-guided
transmission in the Rolls-Royce Wraith. You can't feel it working, but you can't feel it not
working, either. No matter: Like so much of the DB11, it will provide owners with some first-rage
cocktail conversation.
Speed will be another talking point, of course, and the DB11 is very fast - much more so than the
DB9 it replaces. The engine is new: a 5.2-litre V12 with two turbochargers that producess 600
horsepower and 516 pound-feet of torque. Aston claims the car will bolt from zero to 62mph in
3.9 seconds and press on to a top seed of 200mph, The engine is paired with an eight-speed
automatic from German transmission-maker ZF Friedrichshafen. It has cool-to-the-touch metal
shifter paddles behind the steering wheel for those who crave control, but really, I reckon
the transmission is better at the task of gear-selecting than you. Certainly better than me.
Fully kitted, the cabin makes a powerful impression: Swathed in yards and yards of pinked and
perforated hide, it's like sitting in a big Ghillie Brogue. The DB11's infotainment package is an
eon beyond that of its predecessor, thanks to a technology transfusion from Mercedes-Benz(whose
parent, Daimler, owns 5% of Aston Martin). The DB9's Emotion Control Unit, or ECU - a hefty glass
"key" that plugged into a slot on the centre console - has been consigned to history, replaced by
a somewhat less fanciful start/stop button. My heart goes out to Aston dealers, whose profitability
likely hinged on selling replacements for lost ECUs at ￡900 apiece.
The DB11 leads Aston's "Second Century" plan, which, says Palmer, calls for the introduction of
seven new models over seven years, including a replacement for the Vantage sports car and a proper
supercar successor to the Vanquish. There will be a production version of the DBX electric
off-roader concept from 2015,as well, though it will have a more traditional SUV profile and a more
traditional powerplant. And, of course, there will be the mad AM-RB001 hypercar, a labour of love
for Reichman and the Red Bull Racing F1 team's chief technical officer, Adrian Newey.
These are heady times for a company that in the early 1980s was struggling to sell three cars per
week. And yet, Aston Martin is hardly a cash cow: In June, the 103-year-old company reported a 2015
loss of close to ￡128m, its fifth straight year of unprofitability. But the DB11 manages to belie
its maker's tough times. The deftness of its design and the soundness of its execution makes Andy
Palmer's big plans for the future seem much easier to believe. If the former Coolest Brand in
Britain can the maintain the momentum - across seven cars in seven years - we foresee happy days
ahead in Gaydon.