It’s lonely at the drop-top. Convertibles are a paradox, aren’t they? By their very nature, they should bring the car’s occupants to be more in communion with the world around them. Some convertibles see to do that – the little Triumph photobombing our feature car, for instance. The Corniche, though, is an open-top automobile designed to isolate whomever is in it from petty commoners in inferior motorcars or (one shudders to think) lowly pedestrians and vulgar cyclists.
It doesn’t matter whether the soft top is up or down, the effect remains the same. We’re just not worthy.
When the Corniche was new, i.e. between 1971 and 1988, there were precious few cars that were more expensive. R-R’s own Camargue and Phantom VI did manage that feat (especially the former, which certainly proved that money cannot buy taste), but few other models come to mind. In the mid-‘80s, in most European markets, the Corniche cost the price of two Ferrari 400s or three Daimler Double Sixes.
All that with a car whose design, chassis and engine were entering (or well into) their third decade by then: the Rolls OHV V8 debuted in 1959 and the Silver Shadow saloon that the Corniche was based on appeared in 1965. Not that this was a problem: some might have termed it old-fashioned or even antiquated, but Rolls-Royce owners preferred to think of it as traditional.
Even traditional designs need the odd update, which came (among others) in the shape of an increase of the V8’s displacement to 6.75 litres in 1970, a license-built 3-speed GM 400 Turbo-Hydramatic replaced the 4-speed plain-old-Hydramatic in 1968/69 and rack-and-pinion steering from 1977 onward.
The body had to get with the program somewhat, too. The most significant “improvement” was the generalization, for the 1977 model year, of the horrid 5mph rubber bumpers that had plagued North American models since 1974. Both the saloon and its two-door derivatives were thus modified, but only the four-door coupled it with a name change, becoming the Silver Shadow/Wraith II. Corniches remained sans Roman numerals.
The saloons were replaced by the Silver Spirit/Spur range after MY 1980 and the Corniche coupé disappeared in 1981, but the cabriolet remained, aloof and frozen in now quaint mid-‘60s styling, for another decade-plus. That’s commitment to the bit.
Circa 1984, the bumpers switched from plain rubber black to body-colour, which was a good thing. And in 1986 in the US but only in 1988 elsewhere, the monicker ticked over to “Corniche II” for some reason. Then a Corniche III and a IV followed until production was pause in 1995. The Corniche V did exist, though that last one, made in 2000-02, was esthetically based on the Silver Seraph and used the Bentley Continental R platform.
Of course, the whole point of the Corniche was to be apart from current trends, down to minor details. Who else was still making chromed door handles like these in the ‘80s?
The interior is where the traditional stuff really shines, and by this era nobody did it better than Milliner-Park Ward, whose shop was entrusted in putting the Corniche together until they closed down in the early ‘90s. Talk about old-world charm.
Said old-world charm is tempered by all the modern gadgetry one would expect from the most expensive convertible in the world. One cannot attempt to go peasant-crushing without air-conditioning and a decent stereo system to drown out the noise, after all.
It’s a tight fit back here, but that didn’t seem to be a problem for some of the Corniche’s most prestigious clients. In Japan, that would be the Emperor: the palace bought a black Corniche III to ferry Akihito to his enthronement ceremony in 1990. The same car was used for Crown Prince Naruhito (the current emperor)’s wedding soonafter as well, being retired from imperial service only in 2019. But then, neither monarch is very tall.
So if we’re to use the Corniche as a full four-seater, whether for ceremonial or recreational peasant-crushing activities, it would be reserved for mid-sized plutocrats only, at least in the back.
Between 1971 and 1995, Rolls found 6823 clients for their over-the-top drop-top. That’s a feat in itself – not just the impressive quarter-century production run, but also the number of proles trampled by dainty Flying Ladies all over the globe. Maximum respect.
Present-day Rolls-Royce Dawn convertibles provide, I’m sure, very similar results both from the perspective of the owner-crusher and that of the pedestrian-victim, whose final image of this world might well be the one above. But with their squared-off features, their massive 22-inch wheels and their BMW underpinnings, they just don’t have the style and panache of the old Corniche, do they?
Related posts:
Curbside Classic: 1982 Rolls-Royce Corniche Convertible – The Crème de la Crème, by Mike Butts
Curbside Capsule: 1982 Rolls-Royce Corniche – Bringing A Slice Of Fantasy To Suburbia, by Eric703
CC Capsule: 1991 Rolls-Royce Corniche III – Dark Suit And White Gloves Compulsory, by T87
This car screams “Miami Vice” 🙂
Are the “wands” protruding between the headlights contain nozzles for washing those beamy lights?
No, they don’t. The washer nozzles are located in the upper right and upper left corners of the frame that surrounds the headlights. You can see them quite clearly as small black warts there.
They look like headlight wipers to me. Or “a” headlight wiper that does low and high beams in one sweep while the resting position is inbetween.
The wands are the lamp wipers
I’m not sure that I’d ever seen a Corniche when they were new – it’s a species of car I only saw in magazines.
But if I were to envision a Corniche being used new, the image in the below ad is what comes to mind. A genteel couple piloting their Rolls-Royce through a fashionable part of a big city (it’s NYC in the ad). And the car just exudes that panache that no modern equivalent can match.
I like this green color, especially with the dark green interior.
Also, that’s interesting about Naruhito’s wedding – I looked up photos of the procession, and it’s interesting to see the royal couple sitting in the back of the Corniche. It does look like the front seats were positioned pretty far forward, but even so, that’s surprising. I’ve got to wonder how Princess Masako squeezed into the rear while wearing her wedding dress.
The advertisement is brilliant. The way the M-B driver, his face contorted, grips the steering wheel of his cheap clunker while he stares over at the Rolls-Royce. Its occupants, on the other hand, seem perfectly at ease – crushing peasants… Simply magnificent.
For that matter, it’s surprising that the Imperial household of Japan was still buying non-Japanese cars for official purposes that late.
An ’81 gets beat to dead in Who’s That Girl.
This car really hasn’t aged, I still view it exactly as I would when it was actually new. As in, the exact age doesn’t really matter, its more of what it represents (for better or worse depending on viewpoint). It may or may not have been the most capable thing on the road back then but I wouldn’t consider it any better or worse right now, forty years later. That’s not something one can say about very many other cars.
That green interior, though, that I love. It could use a few tufted buttons though if I wanted to be churlish about things. It does scream “money” though, perhaps even the old(er) kind, which the new range surely does not.
I still have to wonder about those taillights, so similar to midyear VW Type 3, MGB or Ford Cortina Mk1 wagon units that it would’ve made all the sense for Rolls to have simply borrowed those mass market parts.
At least in England there was no worry that a freshly crushed peasant would notice the similarities while being loaded into the back of a samaritan’s Cortina or Squareback to go to No Definite Article Hospital, the NHS had seen to there being no reason not to call a proper ambulance.
Since an ambulance ride of a few miles here in the USA can easily cost in the multiple thousands of dollars and plenty of people are deciding to use Uber and Lyft to get to the hospital in an emergency situation, I don’t know that I can fault the NHS for actually stewarding their funds.
“The average invoice for a ground ambulance ride is $2,086” per https://masaaccess.com/learning-center/understanding-ambulance-costs
The average UK ambulance ride costs about 10% that of the equivalent in the US. And Japan costs less than half that of the UK and Germany is under 1 percent of the US cost per the chart at this link:
https://www.ems1.com/billing-and-administration/u-s-has-most-expensive-ambulance-billing-international-analysis-finds
In an odd quirk, in a land with free universal health access, the ambulance services in each state here are far from free. You have to have insurance (it is cheap), or be on a government benefit, or else you could get a nasty surprise.
“Nobbs sighed, as he knew that the loud scrunch of gravel on the driveway meant not just Her Ladyship’s return to Carlingdon Manor but that she had carelessly reduced yet another estate tenant to aggregate. ‘Prepare the compost heap, Mary’ he called. It would be a long night.”
Never been much impressed by these. Rather too close to some variation on the local butcher’s Morrie 1100 – if it was a convertible with the VDP grille – and it’s a state of affairs not helped by a name that sounds as if might need a cream to be salved, corn-itch. (Oh, corn niche, you insist? Well that sounds even more personal, and possibly where the cream might have to be spread, but you’re digressing).
Must agree, though, that when considered against the Potentate’s Piles (or whatever the latest blingaudy topless excressence from Bavaria is named), it expresses a degree of mannerly restraint.
Unlike its drivers.
Just pronounce it something like “Cor-neesh”. And it will sound much smoother in a appropriate way.
Well. And put the accent on the second syllable. That sounds more French and therefore even more refined.
As a child, I wondered if the rear lights came from a Volkswagen Squareback.
Must say I’ve always like these – as a child I remember seeing one in an Abba music video – Money, Money, Money aptly enough. I loved it then and still think they’re fab now (meaning Corniches, but Abba too!). Very classical and elegant styling – although more so in the chrome-bumper days. I’ll never be able to afford one but would have one in my dream garage tomorrow!
Mind you, I’ve always wondered why RR changed the shape of the rear wheel arch. Originally it replicated the front one, with the curve gently straightening to the rear, but at some stage it became much more rounded. Just a minor thing, but enough to change the look of the car – and from some angles the later shape looks a bit odd.
I thought this issue was just a trick of the awful plastic bumpers, and their not wrapping around, but no, by jove, you’re right. What a strange decision. And a poor one aesthetically.
Perhaps there were complaints that peasants were seeing a trifle too much of one’s rear undergirding as they expired beneath?