S (2016)

STORY

The V12 Vanquish, launched at the 2001 Geneva Motor Show, was Aston Martin's flagship and a technological milestone. Designed by Ian Callum from his acclaimed Project Vantage concept, it was among the most advanced Astons yet, with a bonded structure combining a carbon-fibre transmission tunnel with extruded aluminium and a carbon/steel/aluminium subframe.

It used the company's most powerful V12 of the day and an F1-style paddle-shift automated manual transmission, and starred as James Bond's gadget-laden car in Die Another Day (2002), where it earned the nickname "Vanish" for its (fictional) camouflage. It was built at Newport Pagnell as the last Aston made there.

The Vanquish name has since become one of Aston's flagship badges, returning as a V12 super-GT in 2012 and again in 2024, when a new third-generation Vanquish arrived with a twin-turbo 5.2-litre V12 making 824bhp, the most powerful series-production engine the company had ever built.