Bentley Continental R review

As we mentioned, it’s like a limo in the back of the Conti R, with handles at each end of the elongated doors so that both front and rear occupants can unlock and open them. Whether you’d want to sit in the back as a grown adult – wallowing through corners – is another question, but you could probably make yourself quite comfortable doing so.

Other interior quirks include distracting rows of tiny circular gauges, a foot-operated parking brake and a fiddly starter button. Which all simultaneously delight the Millennial with their quaintness whilst vindicating the decision to allow mass-production ergonomics to tidy up the dashboard of its successor, the Phaeton-in-disguise Conti GT. It’s a bit of a mind-scrambling mess in here, but then so’s the floorplan of some of the most enchanting stately homes.

Yup, it’s a cliché, but this really does feel like a plushly furnished abode with four wheels, a mobile annex to your manor with all the aesthetic charm seamlessly carried over. And to say it’s hushed is a clanging understatement. We’ve been in more headbanging libraries.