![]() The influence, impact and excitement of those first Es would never be repeated. Any of those first 56 Jaguar dealer demonstrators parked outside Browns Lane in that memorable, rainy photo of 14 July 1961. No contest: my greatest E has to be an ‘outside bonnet lock’ right-hand-drive roadster. ‘Great’ is a very subjective judgement, clearly, but I would say that as usual the first 3.8 ‘flat-floor’ E-type was the one that spawned all the others, and was the car that created a new bar for ‘affordable’ sports cars, therefore it is the one that would get my vote.Īs a footnote it would be in its fixed-head form, the car that my parents owned and in which I had many memorable journeys lying in the back with my elder brother and Great Dane – less happy when the Great Dane broke wind! Sorry, no question, it’s got to be the original 3.8, either roadster or coupé, in a great factory-delivered colour and without silly modern wheels or obvious mods, thank you. With any great car you either want the pure original design or the most evolved final version, but unless you own a nightclub or a fashion chain I wouldn’t recommend a V12 E-type.ĭespite the silky-smooth engine, the podgy styling and character are more Las Vegas-era Elvis than sharp-suited swinging ’60s. Unusually, I think both the fixed-head coupé and drophead work equally well from a shape and proportion point of view, but it’s the Series 1 that is the icon. ![]() Like so many other cars where stylists mess around with proportions and details for a facelift or a new variant, it just doesn’t work. My best E-type is the first one – the S1. There was nothing like it before or since. In theory the E-type, with its incredibly long bonnet and relatively upright ’screen, had the potential to be a styling disaster and yet its proportions are perfect. For me, they have to pass my 360º test – that is, there is no bad angle to view the car from. There are very few cars in automotive history that are truly beautiful, with perfectly balanced proportions. Professor Gordon Murray CBE, Chairman, Gordon Murray Design The harder you spank it, the more responsive it becomes – makes you smile from ear to there! Pure, but with the early design flaws resolved. For me, it’s the 1963 3.8 fixed-head coupé. Phew! A big question, because every E-type model ticks an individual’s box. Peter Hugo, Director, Winspeed Motorsport Did anybody miss the symbolism of the exuberant Jet d’Eau opposite? I mean the gunmetal car shown to an astonished media on 15 March 1961 at Geneva’s Parc des Eaux Rives restaurant. ![]() My taste for the stripped and bare inclines me towards a Lightweight, but my inner archaeologist insists on the original, the Ur-E, the source of the creation myth, the end of an era, the pivot on which the ’60s swung. ![]() ![]() Has there ever been amore superlatively epochal product than this bogglingly phallic King’s Road chariot? Sexual intercourse, as Philip Larkin reminded us, began in 1963: ‘Between the end of the “Chatterley” ban, And the Beatles’ first LP.’ He could have written: ‘Between the end of the Chatterley ban, And the Jaguar XKE.’ ![]()
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