The Forgotten Jaguar Concept Car That Still Looks Ahead Of Its Time

Which company builds the best, fastest, and sexiest luxury cars? That's not a question; it's a gauntlet thrown on the floor. Absolute statements in response to questions like that are guaranteed to throw polite conversation among auto enthusiasts into chaos. Fastest where? Whose standards determine "sexiest?" The question gets lost amidst shouted hypotheticals. On a few points, however, fans of luxury motoring find harmony. An old Mercedes-Benz can sell for a staggering amount of money, for example.

BMW's low end is often a buyer's best chance for a new luxury car at a survivable price. Jaguar? Love it or hate it, the company makes amazing concepts. No one, but no one, has designed cooler cars without manufacturing them than Jaguar. As far back as 1966 and the XJ13 racer, Jaguar's design team has dreamed big and defied convention (and occasionally common sense) in its quest to deliver big power and new ideas for its customers. 

Vintage gearheads can recite lists of classic Jags that never were: the XJ Spider Pininfarina, which Classic Driver credits with inspiring the Aston Martin DB7; the XK180, which Top Gear still hasn't forgiven Jag for not putting into production; the V12 XJ220 — enough said. Few, however, would mention the Jaguar Consul, and that's a shame. One of Jag's newest concepts, it displayed fresh ideas that other luxury marques are still treating as a decade away.

To a degree, every concept car is about the future. Even Prowler-style throwbacks represent designers guessing what future buyers will want. In that sense, the Jaguar Consul, designed and debuted in 2020, was a pure concept car: the design brief seemingly amounted to "design a Jaguar coupe for 2030." Unusually for a concept car, the Consul's exterior is comparatively understated (via Yanko Design).

The concept's slick teardrop body, long gullwing doors, and squinty LED head and tail lights produce a head-turning silhouette. It looks like the next step from the 2020 F-Type. Instead, in a marketplace promising major changes in motor travel, the Consul's designers realized that the least interesting part of a car from 2030 might be its bodywork (via Behance); the revolution would be inside. The Consul cockpit isn't just compatible with autonomous driving: it's built with autonomous driving as default. Inspired by Venetian gondolas and British river punts, the Consul is its own driver. 

The single front seat actually faces backward, toward the three passenger seats in the back. Driving is an afterthought: the steering wheel is optional and serves the seat furthest left, midway through the car. Every choice reinterprets the whole concept of "car" from something to be driven to something to be ridden in. Whether that concept will dominate 2030 traffic remains to be seen. Regardless, when autonomous vehicles finally take to the road in large numbers, they will owe at least some of their design to Jaguar and the Consul.