Range Rover Evoque & Serena Williams

Never before has there been this much interest in a new Range Rover model, and that attention stretches from London-to-Moscow and on down to Australia.

To ramp things up before the first press day tomorrow (that’s in a few hours) Land Rover in the United States hosted a special event tonight, to give a collection of A-List Celebrities including tennis star Serena Williams and Harvey Weinstein’s entrepreneurial wife Georgina, a close-up of the equally stunning Range Rover Evoque.

‘Anticipated’ doesn’t tell the half of it either. Word has it, that at this week’s Shanghai Motor show, no less than five well-heeled Chinese nationals arrived at the Range Rover stand armed with either a suitcase full of cash or chequebook in hand, fully expecting to drive away in their brand new Evoque. Apparently this type of cash transaction for luxury cars is more the norm than the exception in Shanghai, where cash is clearly, king.

On display tonight were the three and five-door versions of the Evoque and both variants look stunning. Land Rover better start thinking about logistics, as they might well run into supply problems if the US pricing that was mentioned is anything to go by.

The quality of the materials throughout the car rivals that of the XJ Jaguar we are driving around in, even down to the DriveSelector found on the Jag. Evoque also gets a fully electric rear tailgate, which appears to open and close faster that any other vehicle I have driven with this feature.

There’s a huge centre mounted LCD screen and a superbly designed central stack that flows beautifully.

We loved the black wheels and grille bits that are standard kit on the Dynamic model and the front seats, look to have been lifted straight out of  the V8 Vantage – slightly less bolster for increased comfort though.