If you’re anything like me (and given you read this blog, I guess there’s a fair chance you are), you’ll be familiar with the situation: you see a car that causes a severe, possessive reflex of the “I have to have it!” type, and rather than defining your needs beforehand as any normal person would when looking to buy a car (to the extent that was your intention, which in these situations, it usually isn’t), you instead try to define your needs ex-post to suit the object of desire.

This is what happened to me (again…) a couple of weeks ago, and it’s all the fault of the classic car dealer called Emil Frey Classics that I mentioned in my post on the wonderful MB 500 SLC that they had in the showroom back in August. That car caused a similar reflex but not on the same level, and they luckily sold the MB before I had time to do something completely irrational.

Just for memory and as a short background, the Swiss car import market is dominated by a few privately-owned, large importing groups that split the brands between. Emily Frey is the largest of these, and the family behind it and other similar groups regularly rank among the richest in the country (which in the case of Switzerland is saying a lot…). Emil Frey’s “Classics” division handles the exotic cars they trade in from some of their many wealthy customers, and they expose the best of these in a beautiful showroom about 200 metres from where I spend my working day – the definition of professional hazard!

As you may have guessed, the car that’s messed up my mind in the last couple of weeks is arguably the most beautiful four-door sedan on the planet – the Aston Martin Rapide, here in the shape of 2017 Rapide S in the deepest dark blue metallic I’ve seen, with a black leather interior, driven no more than 13.000 kms since new, and traded in from a client’s Aston Martin collection – the poor guy had apparently run out of space. Needless to say, the car was in mint condition.

I’ve always found the Rapide to be a beautiful but intriguing car, and a rare one at that. Over the full 10 years of production no more than 10.000 cars were built, meaning roughly 1.000 per year (but as it was, far more in the first few years and very few from 2017 and onwards), so you don’t see many of them. And you may actually miss it even when doing so, since seen from the front or even from 1/4, you risk taking it for just a regular DB9. It’s only from the side and back that you note that it’s significantly longer.

Indeed, the Rapide is built on the same platform as the DB9 and the V12 Vanquish, but here extended by 30 cm such as to enable two back seats. These are real, separate seats making the Rapide a comfortable four-seater, provided your back passengers aren’t bigger than around 175 cm (5’9″). And should there only be two of you traveling, the two rear backrests can be folded, thereby creating a very sizeable luggage space, given the Rapide is actually not a sedan, but a very stylish hatchback.

First shown as a concept car in 2006, the first series was actually not built in the UK but rather at Magna Steyr in Austria (most famous for building the G-wagon), with final assembly in Gaydon, and with the full production moved there in 2012. In the year after, the second series Rapide S premiered, with power boosted to 558 hp from the initial 470 hp and with other updates, of which the vastly bigger grill is the most obvious one. From 2014 the S also got an eight-speed auto box, replacing the original six-speed. Finally, the Rapide AMR was sold in the last years from 2018 to 2020, limited at 210 cars, and with the engine beefed up to 600 hp and various visual items to underline its sportiness.

Of course a lot of the Rapide’s thrill is in the engine, that wonderful, 5.9-litre naturally aspirated V12, that for some reason says 6.0 litre on the engine block when you open the hood. It’s a well-known engine across the Aston range and considered very reliable if you treat it right. In the Rapide, it provides the jet engine kind of acceleration – not explosive or high-pitched, more of a relentless push, with a satisfying growl. It’s also the type of non-supercharged, non-hybrid engine that we will never see being built again, whatever happens to the car world going forward.

Coming back to the Rapide S I was drooling over, it was as said a 2017 car which is good, as in the Rapide world, the newer, the better (or as the salesman said, in the first series, there were quite a few Mondays in the week on the final assembly line in Gaydon…). Stepping into it, and thereby opening the “swan door” that opens outward but at an upward angle, you find yourself sitting just as low as in a DB9, with what feels like an immense hood in front of you. The cabin is pretty much identical to a DB9 as well, with beautiful materials, leather from more cows than you care to think about, and a really nice and solid feel to everything.

We went for a drive, but it wasn’t one that in any way tested the car’s capabilities. The feeling of driving a big car however disappears quite quickly, and the accompanying, soft growl from the exhaust is very satisfying indeed. Those that have had the chance to drive the Rapide on track however talk about it as very agile and playful for its size, far more so than the Panamera or Mercedes-Benz CLS it’s usually compared to (and both of which it obviously also outclasses in looks).

As we came back, my mind was working in overdrive to create a case for this car. Of course there’s quite a long list of negatives that you can think of and that go from, well, the whole package really, from the V12 engine to the electrical system, where if anything goes wrong, the downside is potentially limitless. Running costs are also on the high side, to put it mildly. That said, it’s far cheaper to run than the only competitor I see, namely the Ferrari FF / GTC 4, where the FF price-wise is comparable, and it’s not like it lacks positives either: the sheer beauty, the rarity, the relative practicality which is really all a couple needs when the kids have moved out, and of course that V12 which beats most of what’s out there.

If, having read this, you feel like me, do note that parking a Rapide in your garage is very much a case of buying the best one you can afford. There are super cheap first series cars out there that are tempting, but not where you want to go. Rather, aim for the second series (the S version), and do so from 2015 such as to benefit from the 8-speed box which helps lower the fuel consumption from something really indecent to half acceptable. Maintenance is really critical, but if done correctly, the Rapide is fundamentally a solid car.

Speculation is no more than that, but I wouldn’t be too surprised if the Rapide price-wise stabilizes at this point, for the above mentioned reasons and because there are so few around. As for me, I tried to find other directions for my lunch walks last week, such as not to pass in front of that shop window, where the very friendly salesman will wave to me every time. Luckily I’m traveling next week, and hopefully someone else will have had time to buy it before I get back…