The Mulliner Bacalar marks Bentley’s return to coachbuilding, but is this low-slung convertible a worthy first go?
The luxury car industry pretty much grew out of the much older trade of coachbuilding.
In the early days of motoring, it made perfect sense to buy a car in the same way you would a carriage – commissioning an artisan to build a body to your own tastes, and without having to worry about the grubby bits that held the wheels on and the horsepower (or horse power) that made it go.
Automotive coachbuilding lasted for many decades, and ran alongside mass production, but the widespread move to monocoque construction pretty much killed it off: it’s hard to chop chunks out of a load-bearing structure.
But now Bentley’s Mulliner division is bringing something very close to traditional coachbuilding back.
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https://www.caradvice.com.au/872249/2021-bentley-mulliner-bacalar-review/
