Have you gotten your dose of righteous indignation today? I sure hope so; your body needs that in order to maintain healthy levels of vitriol in the bloodstream. If you haven’t, I’d like to propose a handy target for your indignation: the sinister and persistent draining of color from our modern lives, and Range Rover’s complicity in this aesthetic crime. It also has to do with Range Rover’s 55th anniversary, so that’s nice.
Yes, it’s Range Rover’s 55th anniversary this year, and I feel bad that I’m about to talk some feces about them because they’re not exactly having a great day. But I think what’s being shown in their celebratory marketing materials contains a message that I hope will be read as a warning, or at least a sort of wake-up call to anyone who currently enjoys color vision.
Before we get into all that, this is a nice visual survey of Range Rover evolution that can’t hurt to view and enjoy:
Man, that side vent graphic didn’t show up until 2001? I thought that was a ’90s thing!
Okay, back to Range Rover’s big 55th. They’ve been promoting it by staging some lovely photoshoots with the same model dressed in period clothing matching a Range Rover of that period, and it’s a striking campaign. Here’s one of their Instagram posts:
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Man, that looks great! Here’s the image itself, in case you have an Insta-allergy:
The blue of that early Range Rover is stunning, it’s boxy charm really bursting through, and that woman’s dress, a riot of purples and violets and browns, stripes and paisleys and swirly patterns that look like book inner jacket marbleizing, it’s wonderful. And gold shoes! Exuberant, classy, of the period.
The ’80s one is great, too:
We have some vivid color like that yellow, and the iconic British Racing Green that was such a hallmark of ’80s Range Rovers, evoking outdoor sportiness and unassailable Britishness all at once. Also, that hat, those buttons, and those earrings. The design of the ’80s was bold and graphic, and this shoot shows all that to great effect.
Okay, now let’s see what they posted for their modern, current era:
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Here’s the full image:
So, here we are, in the year of our fjord 2025, and this is how we’re choosing to express wealth and taste and status. There’s a restraint at play here: the dress is a minimalistic ivory frock, looking kind of like the muslin pattern it was likely made from, the purse and shoes are daring to be ivory and cream or whatever other names for almost-white they come up with (Blanched Mayonnaise? Winter Caulk? Cocaine Unguent?)
Makeup is minimal, hair is pulled back into a sensible ponytail, and that look, that expression, it’s no longer a coy smile or an outright grin, it’s a look of possible recognition mixed with slightly annoyed contempt.
The color palette ranges from white to off-white to copper, taupe, black, and maybe putty. Beiges. Because this is yet another symptom of an aesthetic plague taking over, the plague of beigeification. It’s not just me saying this; beigeification is a known term being used to describe a design trend we’re all trapped in – a trend that seems to spread across disciplines and arenas and kinds of design, like a beige version of the terrifying Sherwin Williams logo, covering the Earth.
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Somehow, beige has become the color of status and wealth and money, based on the idea that the ultra-wealthy don’t want to be too showy with their opulence, so they tone it all down into something that looks like it shares a color palette with the lunch special at a North Carolina coastal fried seafood restaurant. That means that this studious non-showiness has itself become a status marker, and now the beige-er you can be, the wealthier you seem, so boring and restrained has become as showy as gold-slathered everything.
Personally, I think this sucks, deeply, and these Range Rover promo posts just drive the point home, a point I suspect they weren’t trying to make: we were better in the past. Look at that ’70s image! It’s fun and classy and vibrant and exciting! It wasn’t all about class and money, it was about making things that looked engaging and appealing.
The modern Range Rover image that this photoshoot conveys is not connected with traditional Range Rover ideas of being able to go anywhere you want in comfort and style. Modern Range Rover looks like cold, grim opulence, like judgement, like the vain attempt to mask emptiness with wealth, a joyless, pampered slog though life. It looks like making an appearance at a gala and going home and crying and not even full understanding why.
If this is modern Range Rover, I’m okay being kicked out of that club. Maybe I can find out where the people in the old Range Rovers and loud clothes hang out, instead.
Top graphic images: Range Rover
I just can’t get past the huge greenhouse, thin pillars, and low beltline of the older Range Rovers. One drove by the other day and you could see the passenger’s upper arm through the side glass. Now? Not so much.
Stellar outward visibility – the new luxury.
Well there’s a reason for that, it’s because that rollover crash test hadn’t been invented yet.
I’m fine with that. How about a new rollover test that doesn’t require 2.5x the weight (or whatever the spec is)? What is the data showing for deaths from rollovers over time?
Also, some OEMs have thinner pillars – Subaru, Honda, Tesla, etc. Why do the other OEMs struggle so much?
The 80s outfit needs more shoulder pads.
Check it out, you can actually pinpoint the where things break with good taste. Riiiiight here.
(50 seconds in the first video). Though I would actually say the P38 was the last classically styled range rover, The L322 at least tried to keep some of the pure aesthetic. From L405 on out its all downhill. What do you know…the L405 is the first Gerry McGovern designed Rangie. huh…weird….
I designed the lower grill on that SV Autobiography.
Is that a boast or a confession?
I love the model. Her face reflects the times. From colorful enthusiasm to what-are-you-looking-at disinterest.
The place where people with old Range Rovers hang out is called the parts counter.
And the ones with new range Rovers hang out somewhere else? Is the service counter at the dealership really that far from the parts counter?
It is when you have your people drive it there for you.
I have a newer Range Rover. I’m scheduled for October 14 to have some minor (persistent) issues fixed, and that’s the soonest they have a loaner.
COTD material this.
We can’t afford the LR dealer parts counter. We’re mostly at Atlantic British or Rock Auto. Or eBay.co.uk. Lots of time on eBay.co.uk.
Extrapolating the pattern, would the 60th anniversary version basically be a colorless, sterile operating room, with a cadaver? Can that be aesthetic be turned into a vehicle?
I’m afraid we’re already there now…
A giant, slab-sided dumpster of stainless steel with sharp corners sounds about right. I wonder what that would look like…
Enjoyed the attached video of the evolution. My favorite is still the original generation, in the 80s-90s forms when the platform was fully mature. I understand the reasoning behind the modern ones; “luxury” has come a long way in a few decades. On the other hand, given a choice between a modern Rolls-Royce, Bentley, or Range Rover, I’d take the Rover every time. And I’d still insist on driving it on dirt backroads and off-road, as Land Rovers are intended, dammit. Because you don’t/can’t do that in a Rolls or a Bentley.
It doesn’t make me angry at modern design, just sad. It’s just such a hopeless aesthetic, especially as a status symbol. It’s like everybody’s looking over their shoulders, afraid to be seen having any fun. Why aspire to joylessness?
Because we are all disillusioned from the false truth that wealth is something gained through the sweat of one’s own brow, and instead are acutely aware of how wealth is a product of how many people one can crush underneath them. The idea of ornate opulence is directly tied to the divine right of kings.
There’s no going back now, the only way to get to joyful design is through genuine revolution.
I’m investing in companies that manufacture guillotines
Do they have a stock ticker? I can’t find it.
A starter car? This is a finisher car! A transporter of the gods! The golden God!
An amphibious exploration vehicle.
Just don’t eat cereal while driving it
So all of the description is of her dress and hair but none for the brand-new Range Rover Inscription SV Plus 55th Anniversary Autobiography YOU CAN’T BUY ONE WHILE OUR COMPUTERS ARE DOWN in shimmering Settle-For Silver with door trim in rich, warm Already Rusting?
I love that blue in the first image, especially with the exposed hinges. It’s so lush. 🙂
Side note. I had to look at the last picture twice because I thought there was a Photoshop error and the lady had shrunk. It is of course the car that got absurdly gargantuan.
Wow I just looked back and that is a serious size difference.
I had exactly the same reaction!
The wheel/tire size alone!
Thank you. Those low profile tires are horrible on this vehicle.
I believe the British would refer to that color as blancmange.
That blue 2dr Range Rover makes me feel things in my nether regions. The modern ones, not-so-much. They died with the P38a as far as I am concerned.
I like the P38a but I’m hopelessly addicted to original Rangies and Disco I’s. My wife keeps asking me what I might want to replace my steadily rusting-away second-gen Cummins Dodge pickup. I’ll probably go back to a Rangie or Disco from the late 80s or early 90s period, given a chance.
I really want to try a RR Classic at some point. Especially an early 2dr.
My P38 was a pretty good vehicle for me. No major issues, just a few “old car” type things. But there is so much that CAN go wrong with them that it gave me a nervous twitch. The Disco is soooo much less complex and has sooo many fewer things to break. Especially as mine is a very basic stickshift no-sunroofs base truck. But I’d have another P38 if the right one came along.
The sweet spot might be a Disco I with the dual sunroofs and a manual transmission. Still quite manageable to work on mechanically, the electronics were also quite straightforward. (Lucas GEMS engine management is downright sensible.) The Disco sunroofs are simple electric pop-up and slide back across the roof glass units. Not as fussy as the Range Rover’s multi-function pop-up plus drop and retract into the roof setup.
The one I had was an automatic. The ZF autos that they used then are largely bulletproof and I had no complaints; they were part of the generation of automatic-equipped 4x4s around the world that were making the case for autos being superior off-road. No clutch slippage, easy to manage torque when crawling, less to steal attention so you could keep situational awareness on your driving. But a manual is just fun.
Disco sunroofs leak horribly. And they just break all the time. Not worth the bother, especially given how airy Discos are to start with. Though at least they don’t rob any of the massive headroom, LOL. Range Rover sunroofs, at least in P38a’s are pretty bulletproof. My truck is GEMS, and it’s been very reliable in the decade I have had it. An alternator and an idle control valve is it for running issues. And a brake rebuild that was largely my fault. I was in Maine for a slushy spring snow storm, had to drive to MA and back for work, then immediately fly back to Florida. So salt covered, but got home too late to go to the car wash. Parked it for two months in the garage and the calipers and rotors rusted up badly. Oops. But I think ’94 and ’95 Discos are the real sweet spot of the whole range in the States. Pre-OBD-II, so you will basically never see a CEL, and no horrible alarm/immobilizer system entwined through the whole thing. Just about as good offroad as a Defender for a fraction of the price, almost as refined onroad as a RR Classic for a fraction of the price of one of those – and more practical than either with a lot more space inside. And then they went from first to worst with the Disco II.
Definitely agree with the manual. I would not have bothered to buy mine if it had been an automatic, I would have just kept my P38a. Though I will say that the ZF slushbox in the P38a was one of few automatics that didn’t ever annoy me much. Only four gears, so few chances to be in the wrong one, and the big 4.6 v8 didn’t really care which gear it was in anyway (it would get in 4th and stay there most of the time). The smaller 3.9 V8 in the Disco I can’t imagine would pair with it quite as nicely, and the manual does get notably better fuel economy.
I’ve always liked the 14CUX GEMS system with the built-in diagnostic display hidden under the passenger seat. A lot easier than counting check engine light flashes. The whole system is really pretty easy to understand and work on.
When reached for comment, the JLR hackers stated: “We actually thought releasing these shots would cause the company more damage than blocking them”.
As a former smoker, I mostly think of beige as ‘nicotine stains.’
It’s hilarious that the picture that’s all beige is in an old tobacco factory
Since retro is the new hotness, now’s a great time to flip that beige CRT that’s been collecting dust since 1993 to some rich person as a luxurious vintage viewing experience.
The best picture I ever got since I started programming a millennium ago was from a massive 22″ 1920×1200 NEC flat screen CRT monitor. I had two on my massive desk and it was glorious.
“Somehow, beige has become the color of status and wealth and money”
“https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_Tower_penthouse_of_Donald_Trump#/media/File:President_Donald_J._Trump_and_Japanese_Prime_Minister_Abe_Shinzo_(44834623812).jpg”
Not that the link worked, but I have a pretty good idea of what it looked like. Gold – the color of tacky people with no class.
Or as has been said, Donald Trump is a poor person’s idea of a rich person.
Also, Donald Trump’s brain is stuck in 1984. He has no idea whatsoever about current fashion trends.
LOL – no doubt about that. Sort of how my Alzheimer’s riddled grandmother reverted to 1965 when my mom was a teenager. Unfortunately Trump’s dementia is affecting more than his family. <eek>
He is, however, unfortunately up-to-date on current fascist trends.
Sadly even shades of gold would be an improvement over a sea of greyscale cars these days.
I just really hope that you’re going to practice what you preach and commit to wearing dramatic eyeshadow and a paisley kaftan from now on.
I’d be happy if i just showered more than twice a week
Ha ha…just start eating some really good spaghetti…in the shower…then it will be a daily occurrence. Bam! Pao! (Nissan) You’re the new David “Rusty” Tracy!
(Reminder: Keep your chainsaw away from the 2CV’s battery ha ha)
Just drive the deuche with the top down in NC fall and winter weather.
Compared to the room and the new Range Rover, that seafood platter’s a positive riot of color. The golden breading, the bright yellow of the lemon peel, the hints of green and orange in the coleslaw… Was it good?
UGH I do not like giant wheels with minimal side walls. It just looks functionally wrong on a SUV.
Agreed. I wouldn’t trust that thing to hop a curb, much less anything OFF the road.
Needs Mustang 3-spokes ; )
Needs Fuckstones…
Was curious about Range Rover’s target demographics, Google returned this:
So if that target demographic push holds true a decade later, the Millennial Gray and Greige horror show makes total sense.
Oh good, I have aged out of the modern Range Rover demographic.
I’m a crotchety aging coot, which is probably why I like my ancient crusty stickshift Disco I so much.
Here is a good history video on how our homes ended up boring and beige: https://youtu.be/kQ_JIen4vV8?si=gN7w5PvjO6MuSnkn
I thought this was going to be about the window to metal ratio. I get that is part of modern safety standards, but the proportions just look so much better on the old Range Rovers than that new Escalade pictured.
The proportions of the classic Range Rovers are even more fantastic when you’re behind the wheel. You sit high in the greenhouse, able to see everything around you with few obsructions. The window sills are low, so you only have to lean slightly to see clearly alongside your vehicle. The corners of the hood are clearly defined and visible. It was all meant to make off-road driving easier all around and on-road driving in a large (for Great Britain) vehicle more amenable.
All of us who’ve owned classic Rangies and Discos are completely spoiled by the experience. A modern SUV’s visibility pales compared to them.
What year did the stellar outward visibility/design go away?
Probably with the end of the P38A (2000) or L322 (2011), depending on who you ask. The deep-pockets window line gradually shrank, the pillars got thicker, and the default seating height gradually got lower over time compared to the original body style.
The L405 (2012 introduction) has a noticeably smaller rear window and the window line sweeps up to meet it, limiting views out the back and rear passenger windows, like a lot of its contemporaries. The much more modern L460 (introduced 2022) is really embracing the narrower windows of modern cars.
There’s only so much they can do to keep the greenhouse “opened up” as crash protection regulations have closed in. All in all, they probably do better than most. The original just has a remarkably panoramic view for the driver that’s rarely been duplicated.