Rolls-Royce Black Badge Ghost makes its debut in Singapore

Rolls-Royce debuted Black Badge with Wraith and Ghost in 2016, followed by Dawn in 2017 then Cullinan in 2019 for a new segment of clients wanting to drive themselves. Today, a new, Post Opulent expression of Black Badge joins the family. The purest and most technologically advanced Black Badge motor car yet, the Black Badge Ghost.

It's the one colour above all that still manages to consistently exert a special fascination and powerful allure when applied to Rolls-Royce's motor cars - just as it has throughout the marque's long history. Black.

While Rolls-Royce is renowned for developing new colour palettes, the colour black has long been associated with power, strength and authority. It is intense and substantial. Black also speaks of elegance and confidence.

The Asia Pacific region now has one of the highest proportions of Black Badge in the world. Clients are now increasingly familiar with the mathematical symbol that represents a potential infinity, which is found within the motor car's interior.

A new generation of clients desired a Rolls-Royce that was agile, discreet, highly connected and free of any superfluous design. The minimalist new Ghost is not just the most technologically advanced Rolls-Royce yet, but also the most aesthetically pure. In the 12 months since this motor car has been available, it has become one of the fastest-selling products in the marque's history, representing more than 3,500 commissions worldwide.

The new design conversation has centred around 'Post Opulence', an aesthetic movement characterised by reduction and substance. In service to this, exceptional materials are selected and celebrated while overt design is limited, intelligent and unobtrusive. Some Rolls-Royce customers prefer a permanent cloaking of Black in a way that reflects their modern-day tastes and desires.

Still, clients are free to select any of the marque's 44,000 'ready-to-wear' colours or create their own entirely unique Bespoke hue. However, the overwhelming majority of women and men who requested this darker expression of Ghost have selected the signature Black.

To create what is the motor car industry's darkest black, 45kg of paint is atomised and applied to an electrostatically charged body in white before being oven dried. The motor car then receives two layers of clear coat before being hand-polished by a team of four craftsmen to produce the marque's signature high-gloss piano finish.

The iconic high-polished Spirit of Ecstasy and Pantheon Grille have also been 'subverted'. Instead of simply painting these components, a specific chrome electrolyte is introduced to the traditional chrome plating process that is co-deposited on the stainless-steel substrate, darkening the finish. Its final thickness is just one micrometre - around one hundredth of the width of a human hair. Each of these components is precision-polished by hand to achieve a mirror-black chrome finish before it is fitted to the motor car.

The exterior treatment resolves with a Bespoke 21-inch composite wheelset. Designed in the Black Badge house style and reserved for Black Badge Ghost, the barrel of each wheel is made up of 22 layers of carbon fibre laid on three axes, then folded back on themselves at the outer edges of the rim, forming a total of 44 layers of carbon fibre for greater strength. A 3D-forged aluminium hub is bonded to the rim using aerospace-grade titanium fasteners and finished with the marque's hallmark Floating Hubcap, ensuring the Double R monogram remains upright at all times.

On the inside, advanced luxury materials have been meticulously created and crafted for a unique ambience. While recalling the dramatic mechanical intent of Black Badge Ghost, the materials are true to Ghost's Post Opulent design philosophy - one defined by authenticity and material substance rather than overt statement. In this spirit, a complex but subtle weave that incorporates a deep diamond pattern rendered in carbon and metallic fibres has been created by the marque's craftspeople.

Aesthetes from the marques design team elected to further enhance the noir ambience of Black Badge Ghost by subduing the brightwork. Air vent surrounds on the dashboard and in the rear cabin are darkened using physical vapour deposition, one of the few methods of colouring metal that ensures parts will not discolour or tarnish over time or through repeated use. The Post Opulent principles of simplicity have also been applied to dramatic effect in the Black Badge Ghost timepiece design: Only the tips of the hands and the twelve, three, six and nine o'clock markers are picked out, in a subdued chrome finish, creating a remarkably minimal clock. Additional timepieces are available within Black Badge Ghost to suit the client's aesthetic preference.

The capacity of the Rolls-Royce twin-turbocharged 6.75-litre V12 engine was deemed sufficient. However, the flexibility of this celebrated power plant has been exploited to generate an extra 29bhp, creating a total output of 591bhp. The sense of a single infinite gear has also been dramatised with the addition of a further 50Nm of torque, for a total of 900Nm - available from just 1,700rpm. The ZF eight-speed gear box and both front and rear-steered axles work collaboratively to adjust the levels of feedback to the driver, depending on throttle and steering inputs.

To bolster confidence when exploiting Black Badge Ghost, the braking bite point has been raised and pedal travel decreased. Non-Black Badge Ghost is provisioned with a robust braking hardware package that was deemed more than ample under extreme conditions, even accounting for the Black Badge alter ego's increased power output. However, a new suite of bold high-temperature brake calliper paint colours has been developed in preparation for forthcoming Black Badge Ghost commissions.

Car Model	Price as of press time (exclusive of COE)
Rolls-Royce Ghost 6.75 V12 Black Badge (A)	$1,468,888

*Pricing is dependent on specification