Bentley's wonder boy

He's the bloke who's put the pizzazz back into Bentley with the funky Continental family -- GT, Flying Spur and GTC. Brazil-born Raul Pires took time out at the recent international launch of the soft-top GTC in Colorado (USA) to speak exclusively to us.

The affable Brazilian has been at Bentley for the last seven years, during which he's sparked a revolution -- and that's no overstatement -- in the way the brand's offerings are perceived.  The Conti GT has been a huge worldwide success, multiplying Bentley sales virtually overnight.

Consider this: in 2002, Bentley sold 21cars in Australia. The launch of the Pires-penned GT has resulted in Bentley easily topping 100 local sales in 2004 and 2005, and it's on track to do so again this year.

Prior to joining Bentley, Pires had honed his design skills via a two-year stint at Volkswagen and six years at Czech brand Skoda, also part of the Volkswagen Group.

At Skoda, Pires was involved in the design of the Fabia, Fabia Estate, Octavia facelift and Superb, but it's his work at Bentley that has elevated him to the highest echelons of the car-design fraternity.

"Moving to Bentley was a challenge in terms of finding the right design philosophy," Pires revealed to CarPoint at the GTC launch.

"The brand had to follow its heritage and remain English. On the flipside, it was an opportunity to use everything I had learned at Skoda," he added.

"Skoda was a great training school working alongside great designers such as Luc Donckerwolke (who subsequently moved on to Lamborghini and then Seat) and Dirk van Braeckel (now head of Bentley design).

"Dirk (van Braeckel) asked if I wanted to join him at Bentley and I said yes because it would give me a lot more scope to express my artistic side."

Pires says the biggest challenge in designing "budget cars" such as Skodas is to make them look different, due to their tight budgetary/packaging constraints. "You have to be very creative," he confided.

After moving to Bentley, Pires was entrusted with the task of styling the Continental GT -- a task he took to with relish.

"Suddenly I had all this space to do whatever I wanted with. There were hard points, of course…but other than I had a clean sheet to design a 2+2 coupe. I could give it two or four headlights…a big or small grille."

"But in order to design it I had to learn about the Bentley brand, not just the history, but gain an intimate feel for its cars. I had to study, as you normally do…"

Pires eventually looked to the 1952 Continental R Type as a source of inspiration for the new-age Continental GT (which launched internationally in 2003).

His reason? "That was the last pure Bentley…everything after that was Rolls-Royce (derived). The Continental R Type was the fastest 2+2 in its day. And when the Continental GT was launched in 2003 it, too, was the fastest 2+2 in the world."

But while the R Type was the inspiration behind the Conti GT, Pires is adamant that he  "didn't want to do retro". The design he wanted to come up with needed to be thoroughly contemporary.

Describing his handiwork, Pires says the Conti GT has a real "solid feel". Also notable is the fact that it has "floating" headlights and tail-lights -- in other words, they're not linked to shutlines, as is the norm with most cars.

Regarding the decision to launch the GT ahead of the Flying Spur (the sedan variant), Pires says this was arrived at fairly late in the piece.

"There was (initially) no clear direction which would come first," he revealed. "We knew we had to share parts without compromising either."

"But bringing the (GT) coupe out first was the right decision. We already had the Arnage sedan at the time, and we also wanted to promote our motorsport connection."

In keeping with the sporting intent, Pires says the GT's (and GTC's) lines are "wheel-oriented".

"The exterior is all about proportion -- the details come later."

In the case of the GTC convertible, because it lost "volume" at the rear (compared with the fastback GT), Pires said it was necessary to make it up with the "tension of the roofline".

As for why Bentley didn't go down the folding steel lid route (a la Mercedes SL), Pires has this to say: "Bentley is all about being a pure car, and that's why there's no folding hardtop in the GTC."

"A cabriolet is always a (fabric-roofed) cabriolet -- that's part of the romantic charm. And thanks to technology, a cabriolet is no longer colder or noisier than a coupe."

The introduction of the GTC means the Continental family is now complete, but Pires is understandably cagey about what else is waiting in the wings as far as the Bentley product pipeline is concerned.

However, he did reveal that the company won't venture further downmarket in the pursuit of greater sales volumes.

"The GT will remain our most affordable car," he says emphatically.

Raul Pires picks his favourite automotive designs from the past five decades:

1950s - Ferrari 250 GT SWB
Why? "No explanation necessary..."

1960s - Lamborghini Countach (it was shown at Geneva in 1969)
Why? "This car was amazing. It looked like a spaceship. It still looks great. (Marcello) Gandini must have been so inspired when he designed it."

2000s - Yet to decide
Why? "You need to allow the designs time to mature before you can decide."