Project Nightingale Concept by Rolls-Royce

In mid-April 2026, Rolls-Royce announced a program of limited-production specialty cars for presumably discriminating buyers.  A roadster concept car was revealed.

In principle, I rather like the idea.  It harkens back to the 1920s and 1930s when luxury cars were given special bodies -- usually one-off custom designs.

Rolls-Royce's public relations web presentation includes the following:

"Still in its concept phase, Project Nightingale’s aesthetic is grounded in the belief that the most exquisite design emerges from precision, where function and form are inseparable.

Project Nightingale also draws inspiration from Rolls-Royce's red-badged 'EX' experimental prototypes of the 1920s — particularly 16EX and 17EX — some of the rarest
and most desirable motor cars in Rolls-Royce’s history.

These foundations informed Project Nightingale's three core principles."

"Coachbuild Collection unites a true coachbuilt motor car and an extraordinary multi-year programme of experiences.

The clients invited to join this remarkable programme have a special affinity with the brand.  As collectors of one-of-a-kind opportunities, they will be granted rare access to the innermost design studios within Rolls-Royce and gather for events in the world’s most desirable destinations."

"As the most exclusive division of Bespoke, Coachbuild is the automotive equivalent of haute couture. The invitation-only service offers individuals of extraordinary achievement, culture, and vision to craft an entirely original motor car — and stake claim in the marque’s legendary history."

That said, let's take a look at the associated concept car, along with my commentary.  I need to note that it's electricity-powered (or intended to be so, if that car isn't functional).  I think that is not a good idea, given the problems inherent with that technology.  But seriously rich buyers might not mind, because they would have other, more practical cars available.

Photos below are via Rolls-Royce, colors adjusted my me.

Gallery

The grille is similar to Rolls grilles of the past decade or so.  The vertical lights on the fender fronts are in the spirit of current Cadillac and Kia designs -- not unique.

The profile is in the same spirit as recent Roll sedans.  Note the "suicide" door hinging.

For some reason (Teslas?), electric car styling by many carmakers tends to be simpler than styling of conventionally-powered equivalents.  Same story here.

Concept cars often lack bumpers because those could interfere with the intended visual concepts presented.  This car does have bumpers, but they seem too puny for everyday protection.  A front bumper that's a bit more forward of the grille might work.

But the tapered rear bodywork seems at some risk, given the bumper seen here.

Cockpit view.  Instrumentation is hard to detect.  Maybe it's all in an electronic screen that's not activated in this image.

Four-Door British "Airline" Sedans

I posted "Gallery of English 'Airline' Designs" here, presenting examples of fastback (or at least rounded) aft end profiles applied to basic 1930s production cars.   The idea was that those less-angular rear ends offered streamlining -- improved aerodynamic efficiency.  In practice, since old-style front ends were essentially retained, such improvement was probably minimal.  Basically, it was a styling fad.

The majority of British "Airline" cars were two-door models, though I did discuss the 4-door 1935 Clémont-Talbot 105 Airline Saloon here, and the 1938 Riley 16/4 2.5-litre Kestrel Blue Streak Six-Light here.

Today's post presents a larger collection of four-door Airline designs.

Gallery

1936 Riley Kestrel Six-Light Saloon - HandH Auctions photo
Given the need for rear doors and headroom for back-seat passengers, 4-door Airlines were seldom as sleek as many of the 2-door variety.  That said, another factor was wheelbase; short-wheelbase 2-door Airlines also lacked sleekness.  Rileys were sporty cars, hence the long hood seen here.  But the passenger compartment was fairly compact and set aft, so the car's profile is smoothly curved, but not what I consider sleek.  The term "six-light" is the British version of "six-window" in American.

1938c. Standard Flying Twenty - publicity image
Mid-1930s 4-door British and French sedans tended to feature beltlines that fell off towards the rear.  Details varied, as can be seen in the image collection here.  The only exception is the Rover shown three images below.

1935 Talbot (British) Airline Saloon - car-for-sale photo
As mentioned above, I dealt with this car in a previous post.  Back seat headroom seems limited, but results in the sleekest profile shown.

1937 British Salmson by Whittingham & Mitchell - publicity image
Another British offshoot of a French brand.  This is the one side view I could find. This car has the most vertical aft profile of the set pictured here.

1934 Rover Speed 14 Streamline "Coupé" - Bonhams photo
Marketed as a "Coupé, the body type is what I would call a close-coupled sedan.  The reason for that curious "coupé" designation was that Rover also offered a 14 Streamline Saloon.  It had a boxier body than the Coupé's, but at least featured a rounded aft profile.  Details: this car is a "four-light," whereas the saloon was a "six-light."

1935 Bentley 3.5 Litre Aerodynamic Saloon by Rippon Brothers - Bonhams
Another "four-light" design.  Falling-off beltline yields a large rear-door window.  The aft profile is a subtle S-curve, adding a touch more sleekness.

1934 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental Streamlined Saloon by Park Ward - Gooding photo
Long wheelbase, considerable sleekness on this early (1934) Airline-type design.  Magnificent.  I wrote about it here.

Streamlined 1934 Four-Door Rolls-Royce

It seemed like "streamlined" car designs were popping up everywhere around 1934.  Probably the most famous was the '34 Chrysler Corporation Airflow line that had actual wind tunnel input regarding shaping.   Also wind tunnel shaped were the new 1934 Tatra 77s from Czechoslovakia.

Other streamlined cars were "streamlined" in little more than name only.  Today's post considers a spectacular custom-bodied 1934 Rolls-Royce whose general features were in line with streamlining as practiced in England at that time.  I posted about such designs here, and some examples are pictured below.

The featured car is a 1934 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental Streamlined Saloon.  It was auctioned a while ago by Gooding, Internet link here.   It notes:

"1934 Olympia Motor Show Car

"Stunning One-Off Streamlined Coachwork by Park Ward Ltd.

"One of Just 281 Phantom II Continentals Built

"Multiple Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance Awards"

Gallery photos of it are via Gooding.

Gallery

1934 MG PA Airline Coupe - car-for sale photo
Here are some other English "streamlined" cars pictured to put the Rolls design into context.  "Airline" was a term used in the UK during the 1930s that usually meant a car with a production front end and a rear shaped in an aerodynamic motif.  True aerodynamic efficiency required a wind tunnel tested front.

Triumph Gloria Flow Free - at 1934 motor show
This Triumph was longer that the MG show above, so the body shape is more graceful.  The slanted windshield was slightly more aerodynamically efficient than a vertical windshield would have been.  As best I can tell, most Airline type cars were two-door sedans or coupés -- body types better suited than four-door sedans (saloons).

1935 Talbot Airline Saloon - car-for-sale photo
That said, here is an example of an Airline saloon.  Note that the passenger compartment is "close coupled" -- short, so again suitable for 1934-vintage "streamlining."

1934 Rolls-Royce Phantom II Continental Streamlined Saloon by Park Ward - Gooding Auction photos
Now for the Rolls-Royce.  Not close-coupled.  Six-light (window) arrangement.  The front fenders (wings) are a curious combination of a cycle-fender with a tapered extension linked to the running board.  Otherwise, the front end is what one would expect to see on a Rolls-Royce of that vintage.

The fastback profile with the thick D-pillar area and trunk (boot) provides a touch of bulkiness.  But the aft side windows and skillful shaping by Park Ward minimize that.  The thrusting front related to the axle line and cycle-fender treatment act as a counterpoise to the rear.  Aside from those odd extensions to the fenders, this is excellent styling for its time.

The car looks sleek in the quarter-view.  The lack of bumpers helps the design's purity.

Overhead view showing tapered shaping that's in line with what tunnel testing would have suggested.  Note that the rear fender forms echo those from up front.

Another overhead view.  Yes, I could nit-pick more details, but the design is so impressive that I won't bother.

Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud Walkaround

Rolls-Royce began building its own car bodies in 1949 when the Silver Dawn model was launched.  Of the in-house designs starting then, I think the best looking was the early-series Silver Cloud that appeared in 1955.

Here in America it gained attention by David Ogilvy's famous "At 60 miles an hour the loudest noise in this new Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock" advertisement that I mentioned in my post "The Rolls-Royce with the Noisy Clock".

Wikipedia states that the lead stylist for the Silver Cloud was John Blatchley.  Two quotes of interest from Wikipedia (as of 21 May 2023) are:

"John Polwhele Blatchley (1 July 1913 – 16 February 2008) was a London-born car designer known for his work with J Gurney Nutting & Co Limited and Rolls-Royce Limited.  He began his career as designer with Gurney Nutting in 1935, moving up to Chief Designer before leaving in 1940 to join Rolls-Royce.  There he served as a draughtsman (1940–43), stylist in the car division (1943–55), and chief styling engineer (1955–69)."

"Development of new models continued but the designs presented to the board meeting which would decide on the new model to be introduced in 1955 were rejected as being too modern.  In the space of a week Blatchley produced a complete new concept to the board's requirements and it was immediately accepted... This became the Silver Cloud and S Type [Bentley], Rolls-Royce's last standard models based on a separate chassis."

Walkaround  images below are of a 1956 Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud Sedan by Bring-a-Trailer Auctions.  The car has the standard 123-inch (3124 mm) wheelbase.

Gallery

The famous advertisement by David Ogilvy.  Click on the image to enlarge.

The classic Rolls-Royce Radiator grille design was retained -- but got increasingly altered in future redesigns.

It wasn't as easy at it might seem to combine the classic grille and hood with an envelope-type body where most element were integrated, rather than separate (as they were before the mid-1930s). 

The passenger compartment greenhouse hints of "razor edge" English coachbuilder designs of the 1930s and '40s.  

The trunks shape is rather bland, but that might have been necessary so as not to compete with and detract from other, more important details.

It doesn't even carry the Rolls-Royce logotype that's found below, on the bumper.

The character lines on the fender sides add interest and help reduce potential slab-sidedness.  Chrome trim in their place would have been disastrously undignified for "The Best Car in the World."

The fenderline is in line with post- World War 2 styling fashion.  The basic profile resembles that of the redesigned 1950 Buick Roadmaster line. 

But the rear fender retains a greater degree of separation due to its stronger front edge.  Besides the grille, frontal details that link the design to the past are the headlight assemblies and the rounded fender fronts.

Gallery of English "Airline" Designs

Around the mid-1930s there was a British styling fad known as the "Airline" body.  Typically, these cars were two-door coupés or saloons (sedans) with rounded rear profiles that suggested streamlining.   Given that front ends were normally strictly stock and aerodynamically messy, those rear ends did little or nothing to improve aerodynamic efficiency.  That said, they are interesting to look at, and serve as counterbalances to normal, conservative British car design examples from before, say, the 1950s.

I discussed Airline design using a particularly nicely-styled example here.

The cars shown in profile below are arranged in ascending price-prestige order.  Exceptions are the final two, which are of special interest.

Gallery

c.1933 Hillman Aero Minx 2-3 Seat Saloon - unknown photo source
A tiny car based on a popular model.  Besides the rounded profile, there are no running boards.

1935 Hillman Aero Minx Cresta Saloon - car-for-sale photo
This four-passenger version has a "pillarless" window arrangement that resembles post- World War 2 "hardtop convertible" styling.  Except the after side window does not roll down, being in effect part of the body structure.

1936 MG PB Airline Coupé - Sussex Sports Cars photo
A two-passenger Airline.

1937 Talbot 10 "Airline" Sport Saloon - Anglia Car Auctions photo
Another "pilarless" Airline.

1935 SS1 20HP Airline Coupé - Bonhams Auctions photo
SS was the predecessor of the Jaguar, whose brand-name appeared on what had been SS cars during 1935, but apparently after this one was built.  A four-passenger car, but with a normal B-pillar.

1935 Rolls-Royce 2-Door Airline Coupé by Barker - Jonathan Wood Restorations photo
A very attractive Airline design.  Note the fashionable drooping beltline also seen on the Minx Cresta and SS1 above.  In each instance, the beltline curve is abaft of the door, as is the roof curve..

Triumph Gloria Flow-free - at 1934 motor show
This is the design I featured in the post linked above.

1935 Talbot 105 Airline 4-Door Saloon - car-for-sale photo
A dramatic design with four doors, not the usual Airline two-doors.

John Reinhart's Complaint

John M. Reinhart (1916-1986) led Packard styling 1947-51 and later worked at Ford where he is credited with the design of the 1956 Continental Mk. II.  While at Packard he was responsible for its redesigned 1951 line.

Regarding that design, he has been quoted in the Packard Cormorant (No. 129, Winter 2007, page 30) and elsewhere as stating that the car looked "...bottom heavy.  I wasn't particularly happy with it, but then I hated every design I ever made anyway.  You never get what you really want because you have to compromise; the thing could have been a lot better looking had we the option of altering the glass along with the sheet metal."  It seems he would have liked to lower the main body to provide another 1 1/2 inches (35 mm) of glass, but Packard engineers supposedly wanted to limit the amount of glass for price reasons.

The situation might have been more complex than that.  Packard built luxury cars (along with lower-priced models using the same basic body).  If I had been in charge of Packard marketing or product planning an important consideration would have been the design's "image" as a luxury car.  To a degree, that would trump the aesthetic considerations Reinhart favored.

Therefore, let's examine luxury car design circa-1950 to see where the 1951 Packard fits.

Unless noted, images below are of car listed for sale.  All are of four-door sedans for comparative purposes.

Gallery

1951 Packard Patrician 400 - Bonhams auction photo
Patricians were the top of Packard's line.  Side window height is less than one-half the height of the lower body.

1951 Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn
Silver Dawns had factory bodies and were meant to be owner-driven.  English luxury cars tended to have large-appearing side windows, though these are proportionally only marginally taller than Packard's.

1950 Daimler DE36 Touring Limousine by Freestone & Webb - auction photo
The same can be said for Rolls' rival.

Jaguar Mark VII
This Jaguar, a semi-luxury car, has windows about half the distance from rocker panel to beltline.

1951 Mercedes-Benz 300 W186
Yet again, similar.

1952 Lincoln
The redesigned '52 Lincoln has windows about the same proportion as Packard..

1950 Cadillac Sixty Special
The redesigned for 1950 Caddy's windows are noticeably narrower than Packard's.

1951 Packard 300
Long-wheelbase '51 Packards such as this 300 had three-piece wraparound backlight windows.  These give the car an airy feeling that complements the solid-looking lower body.

1951 Packard 200
But entry-level 1951 Packards had smaller backlights.  As seen here, Reinhart's complaint has some validity.

1951 Kaiser Golden Dragon - RM Sotheby's auction photo
Kaiser's attractive 1951 design has tall side windows, perhaps a bit more height than Reinhart mentioned.  Their ratio to lower body height was about 58 percent as opposed to Packard's 42 and Cadillac's 35.  But Kaiser was not a luxury brand.  In the early 1950s a Packard with Kaiser proportions would not have seemed big, solid, important.  Perhaps not worth spending luxury car dollars for.

What Were They Thinking? Michelotti's Vignale Rolls Royce

"The Ugliest Roll Royce Ever?" -- That was the title of a 2001 piece on Motor Trend magazine's web page.  Well, maybe.  But there might have been a few that were worse.

The cited car was a 1954 Roll-Royce Silver Wraith with a custom body by Italian coachbuilder Vignale completed in 1955.  The designer was the well-known Giovanni Michelotti who later designed production car bodies for Triumph.

Being a custom bodied automobile, its design features were influenced by Vignale's client.  Some of this is mentioned here on the Bonhams auction web site in reference to its 2014 offering at Quail Lodge in California.  What might be important is that he was an American.  Which suggests that he wanted the car to have 1954-vintage American styling features.

Gallery

The car was on display for a while at the Blackhawk museum in California's Bay Area.  That is the source of this and similar images below.  The "ugly" bit is the front end design that features the then-standard Rolls grille along with 1954-vintage styling features such as "Frenched" headlight assemblies and flow-through fenders.

Here is a Michelotti proposal drawing of the car.

This side view shows that the actual car was longer than as depicted by Michelotti.  Though it needs mentioning that his drawings were not always true to form, as I posted here.

Aside from the front end, the most distinguishing feature was the reverse-slanted backlight window.

The 1953 Packard Balboa concept car's back window design might have influenced Vignale's client, but I can't rule out the possibility that it was Michelotti himself who was influenced by the Balboa.

A view of the rear end, unknown source.  The styling seems far more American than Italian.

Front view via Bonhams.  All the headlight assemblies are fussy, adding to an already cluttered composition.  The grille-flanking openings add to this because of the wide spacing of their vertical bars that contrast with the Rolls-Royce grille bar spacing.  Michelotti should have used the latter's spacing on the flank openings.

I think this might be the most attractive view of the design (Bonhams photo).  Very 1954 American (but no garish two-tone paint scheme).