For this year’s Geneva Motor Show, boutique Swedish hypercar firm Koenigsegg will be showcasing the Agera RS Gryphon, an utterly bespoke vehicle. The hypercar boasts sleek lines that allude to its namesake — a mythical creature that is half lion, half eagle and the embodiment of strength and speed — and is also adorned with a 24-carat gold leaf finish. The precious metal, painstakingly applied by Italian master craftsman Ettore ‘Blaster’ Callegaro, adorns exterior badging, makes up the body’s racing strips, adorns interior surfaces, and has even been used on the engine and to dress the hood’s struts.
To ensure the gold has the optimal contrasting effect, the car’s body has been left in naked, albeit clear-coated carbon fiber so that the Gryphon’s structural integrity is presented as art as well as science.
Yet as impressive as its exterior appears, it’s what it covers that truly makes this car spectacular. Sitting behind the Alcantara-trimmed driver and passenger seats is a 5-liter V8 engine designed, developed and built from the ground up by Koenigsegg itself, which, thanks to prodigious twin-turbocharging and some serious engineering knowhow, outputs a frankly physics-defying 1360hp. A bespoke Gryphon motif shines on the head rests, while another image of the mystical creature is stitched into the Alcantara dashboard.
To put Koenigsegg’s engine into context, the Bugatti Veyron, a car built using the immense R&D reach of VW, the world’s biggest carmaker, needed 16 cylinders, an 8-liter capacity and four turbos to generate ‘just’ 1001hp.
And, even with the gold leaf, luxuriously appointed interior, full infotainment system and hydraulics for raising either the front or rear end for overcoming things like speed bumps, this car tips the scales at 1,395kg. That’s just a passenger seat and a few creature comforts short of the magical 1:1 power-to-weight ratio that’s the supercar maker’s holy grail.
The Agera RS Gryphon will make its global debut at the Geneva Motor Show, before being handed over to its owner. After all, from the gold leaf to the engine output, this car has been built specifically to a client’s requests —one of which was that the finished car be completely road legal in the US, where it is set to be driven.
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