- An example of China’s take on Rolls Royce has sold for $1.5 m to a Middle-Eastern buyer.
- The Hongqi Golden Sunflower Guoli Lanting Yayun is styled like a 1960s communist limo.
- Traditional Chinese craft techniques and materials are used throughout the luxury interior.
Most people who choose a Chinese car outside of the country are lured by bargain pricing, but that’s definitely not the case with this retro-sedan. A UAE-based buyer just shelled out $1.5 million for it, and he can’t even say he’s the first owner. So much for the whole “Chinese cars are cheap” stereotype.
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However, the car in question is no ordinary Chinese model. It’s the Hongqi Golden Sunflower Guoli Lanting Yayun, and if that name seems a bit OTT, just wait until you get a load of the interior. Created using a mix of modern technology and traditional Chinese crafts, it’s light years away from the BYD Seagull and the other EVs most of us think of when we picture a Chinese vehicle.
Traditional Meets Tech
According to Car News China the Hongqi’s console and door trims use a Fuzhou bodiless lacquerware technique that involves hand-applying 28 layers of natural lacquer on a surface inlaid with mother of pearl that depicts excerpts of Lantingji Xu, a piece of Chinese calligraphy written over 1,500 years ago.
Text from the poem can be projected onto the dashboard and scenes from it are embroidered onto the seat backrests, a process that takes two embroiderers 600 hours. Other Chinese luxury touches include an armrest lid whose gold foil base depicts more of the country’s famous artworks.
The outside of the huge 6 m (19.6 ft) Guoli limo, which was known as the L5 until a 2024 rebrand, is less flashy. But the retro-communist design and a tilting, retractable flagpole that points towards the North Star will certainly ensure it stands out from the hundreds of Rolls Royces cruising around the UAE, which could be why its owner chose it.
That owner is reported to be businessman Stanislav Semenov, who despite forking out ¥11 million ($1.5 m), doesn’t even get to say he’s the car’s first owner. Though the 382 hp (389 PS) V8-powered limo has zero-miles on the clock and is unused, it was pre-registered to make export simpler.
Hongqi
