Behind the Design: Rolls-Royce Phantom

The British brand is famous for bespoke vehicles, promising customers a unique luxury vehicle from any inspiration. While we’ve seen a Phantom’s exterior colour based on a green apple, and many exotic inspired ones, this vehicle from Bespoke Collective has a personal touch.

The floral interior of the bespoke Phantom was created with a million embroidered stitches. . Photo: Rolls-Royce

A new Rolls-Royce Phantom has been commissioned by a Stockholm-based entrepreneur with an extraordinary passion for flowers.

The patron, with a wife and two of four children named after flowers, challenged the Rolls-Royce Bespoke Collective comprising designers, craftspeople and engineers, to envision a car that immerses its occupants in a beguiling floral scene. The result is a sanctuary of true luxury, a vision of flowers, created with a million embroidered stitches.

Rolls-Royce Motor Cars chief executive, Torsten Müller Ötvös, commented, “The Rose Phantom is a stunning iteration of a contemporary Rolls-Royce. Our extraordinary craftspeople at the Home of Rolls-Royce have achieved, with this car, something which can only be described as sublime.

“The work of our Bespoke Collective is the best in the world. When I look at creations like this car, it is with a sense of pride that I know that these skills could not be replicated anywhere else in the world. This is undoubtedly one of the greatest Rolls-Royce Phantoms of its generation.”

The Rose Garden at the Home of Rolls-Royce in Goodwood, West Sussex, UK served as the primary point of inspiration for Ieuan Hatherall, a Bespoke Designer for Rolls-Royce.

The exterior colour is Peacock Blue and there is embroidery on the inside of the rear doors. Photo: Rolls-Royce

This Rose Garden is the only place in the world that the Phantom Rose is grown. Bred exclusively for Rolls-Royce by British rose breeder Philip Harkness of Harkness Roses, the Phantom Rose grows in the courtyard of the marque’s Global Centre of Luxury Manufacturing Excellence at Goodwood in West Sussex, England.

Hatherall commented, “There is a transcendent beauty when a rose garden is in full bloom. The patron wanted to create that same feeling of awe; an abundance of flowers to lift the spirit and celebrate nature’s decadent beauty, in the Rose Phantom’s serene interior.”

The Peacock Blue exterior of the Rose Phantom is punctuated with a Charles Blue twinned-coachline that intertwines organically like the stem of a rose, combining to introduce the rose motif, an indication of both the colours and the treatment within. The wheels echo the design and are embellished with a twinned pinstripe, also in Charles Blue.

The inspiration for the embroidery was Phantom rose grown at Rolls-Royce head office. Photo: Rolls-Royce

On opening the coach doors, there is embroidery on the inside of the rear doors, but it is not until entering the rear cabin that one fully encounters the extraordinary extent of the satin stitch creation.

The Phantom Rose is illustrated in varying stages of maturity, from bud to full bloom, in an asymmetrical design that appears to grow across the roof lining, from the rear of the car. The marque’s fabled starlight headliner illuminates the scene as the roses are interspersed with individually placed fibre-optic lights.

In the rear compartment, Serenity Seating with a soft calf rest cushion adopts the inverted colour-way of the exterior as sumptuous Charles Blue leather is accented with Peacock Blue piping. The Phantom’s Gallery has stems of embroidered roses climbing through the glass fronted fascia.

At the request of the patron, colour is introduced in the form of Peacock and Adonis Blue butterflies. The customer’s family also played a creative role; his wife designed the umbrellas while his daughter, Magnolia, defined the exterior hue of this Phantom. The owner commented, “I wanted to have flowers and roses everywhere. It became an amazing piece of art.”

The floral theme is everywhere in the Phantom, including the front gallery. Photo: Rolls-Royce

Interview courtesy of Rolls-Royce