Ferrari California

For anyone with a shred of creativity, the very idea of pandering to your market is enough to chill the bones. Films, music, fashion, art… has any good ever actually come of canvassing punters’ opinions, then delivering what they asked for? Of course not.

No wonder the alarm bells started ringing at a deafening volume when Ferrari confirmed that its keenly anticipated new model would be a convertible with a folding hard-top roof, a market-driven device if ever there was one. Ferrari might be many things – not all of them flattering, truth be known – but a purveyor of soft-centred automotive bling to footballer’s wives or Beverly Hills cosmetic surgeons it most certainly isn’t. The purists panicked.

Relax. The California might have a voguish roof, but the rest of it is proper Ferrari. OK, so it’s not the prettiest Prancing Horse of recent times (you have to go all the way back to 1994’s F355 to find that) but it has a glorious 4.3-litre V8, handles with the customary graceful balleticism, and has a truly sensational new dual-clutch semi-automatic transmission that changes gear in a way that magically combines smoothness with ultra-fast precision.

-Jason Barlow

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