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Jaguar Cars unveiled its 2009 XF sedan at Frankfurt today. And while we applaud styling director Ian Callum for dodging the same tired set of Jaguar-signature design cues, it just seems he's tried just a bit too hard to reinvent the brand. One very compelling little feature, however, gleams on the inside, just within arm's reach on the center console. It's called the JaguarDrive Selector, and it was created with more than a little help from the world's avowed master of industrial design, Apple Computer.
More after the jump.
Photos courtesy of Jaguar.
Intended to reinvent the old-fashioned Jaguar J-gate shifter, the
JaguarDrive Selector features a knob that rises from a flush position when the car is started. The driver then simply puts a foot on the brake, presses the Selector's black Start button, and twists the knob to engage the car's six-speed automatic transmission—P, R, N, or D. Behind the knob is an electronic parking brake, and buttons to engage sport/winter mode and to deactivate stability control. There's also a button to engage a feature called ASL — Automatic Speed Limiter.
When activated, the system does exactly what its name suggests: It limits the car to a preset speed — quite useful, we'd say, if you live in a place that has embraced the speed camera as a revenue-booster.
So is the JaguarDrive Selector cool enough to make the XF as covetable as an iPhone? Not likely. But we admire the kind of fresh thinking that prompted the collaboration. Apple seems able to do no wrong these days, design-wise, and Jaguar is a brand that has rested on tradition for far too long.
The 2009 Jaguar XF
