Rolls Royce has lifted the lid off its latest product – a one-off bespoke creation from its coachbuild unit called the Arcadia Droptail.
The Arcadia is undoubtedly a beautiful car, both inside and out. And although there is no mention of the powertrain of this exquisite beauty, we can only guess that it is in line with other models in the Droptail series: a 6.75-litre twin-turbo V-12. Which in itself is just as impressive as all the other details that the British auto brand chose to share.
But it makes you wonder why. Why would the brand ignore seemingly important details to focus on the number of hours it took to make the most distinguishable feature of the car, the woodwork, which runs from the rear deck all the way to the fascia?
Sales really is a numbers game
In the world of luxury, what a product can do, and how well it performs is just as important as the hours of labour that went into its production.
Or at least that is what mentioning the number of hours, minutes or seconds that went into a product/feature appears to be about. By highlighting the fact that it took over 4 years from the date of request to the day of commission, and that, more than one of these 4+ years was spent on just selecting and fitting the wood into the car, with an additional 1,000 hours spent testing how the specially-lacquered wood held up to different extreme weather conditions, Rolls Royce wants future clients to know that the Arcadia is not just another luxury vehicle, and at the Maison, perfection is not an illusion.
It is the same strategy other luxury brands use. For example, simply stating that a Birkin is made from the finest Togo leather is not as powerful as saying that it took x number of hours to select the right leather and work it to fit a standard Birkin.
The value of luxury goods depends strongly on the process used to bring it to life
One of the reasons why mined diamonds are more expensive than lab-grown diamonds is the number of hours it takes to produce a single diamond in both processes. A single lab-grown diamond can take anywhere from 6 to 10 weeks, while one mined diamond can take a whooping 6 months to process from the day it was extracted from the earth.
The thousands of hours it took to make the Arcadia a reality is why coach-built vehicles cost as much as they do. The media has speculated that the Arcadia Droptail costs at least $30 million and when you consider that building just one part took a little over a year, it makes sense.
It isn’t only the woodwork production time in the Arcadia Droptail that gets an honourable mention
Remember La Rose Noire and the Amethyst, the two bespoke Droptails that well, dropped last year? Recall that both of them had detachable timepieces: an Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Concept Split-Seconds Chronograph for La Rose Noire and a one-of-one Les Cabinotiers Armillary Tourbillon for the Amethyst.
Well, this time around, per the client’s request definitely, Rolls Royce manufactured its own dashboard clock and made sure to mention it as well. Here’s how the British auto brand says it: it “is the most complex Rolls-Royce clock face ever created: the assembly alone was a five-month process, which was preceded by more than two years of development.”
So yes, it took 8,000+ hours to choose, design and protect the wood on the Rolls Royce Arcadia Droptail, as well as thousands of hours to develop and assemble the dashboard clock. Not to mention, the entire project lasted for over 4 years. And there is only one reason why we know all this: in the world of luxury, the devil is in the details.
