2016 Lagonda Taraf

Offered by Bonhams | Cheserex, Switzerland | September 29, 2019

When Aston Martin announced that they would be building a four-door car in the mid-2000s, Lagonda would’ve been a solid choice for a name. After all, they’ve built multiple four-door Lagonda models in the past 50 years, including some as late as the early 1990s. They went with “Rapide” instead.

Lagonda, as a marque, was founded in 1906 and built luxury cars through their acquisition by Aston Martin in 1947. The marque was phased out after 1965 and subsequent Lagondas were models in the Aston line. Until 2015, that is.

Aston resurrected the Lagonda marque for this, the Taraf (which means “side” in Turkish). It’s based on the same platform as the DB9 and Rapide, and it is powered by a 533 horsepower, 6.0-liter V12 paired with an eight-speed automatic transmission that could propel the car to 60 mph in 4.4 seconds on the way to a 195-mph top end.

The target market for the car was the Middle East, which was pretty much the only market. This Kuwait-registered example is one of only 120 built between 2015 and 2016. The goal was to make a Rolls-Royce seem commonplace, and cheap, too, apparently: the Taraf retailed for a cool $1 million. This one has covered only 50 miles and should bring between $850,000-$1,100,000. Click here for more info and here for more from this sale.

Update: Not sold.