1997 Jaguar Xk8 2-door Coupe Racing Green With Tan Interior. Amazing Condition on 2040-cars

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Who picks car colors and materials? Designers like Hannah Custance

As automotive journalists, we're often asked "how did you get that job?" People usually didn't even know you could do such a thing. In this 7 Questions series, we're highlighting other jobs in the automotive industry that you might not have heard about before. What do they do, how'd they get to do it and other questions about their particular corner of the car world. Slowly but surely, the automotive landscape is becoming more colorful. Look beyond the unrelentingly conservative palette of white, black and gray most buyers opt for and you'll see the increased use of exterior trim types beyond the usual chrome. There's gloss black, of course, but also other metallic finishes like gold or copper. Those can be found inside, too, where there's also an increase in colorful leathers and trims, innovative fabrics, new wood types and finishes, and greater creativity in general. So where is this change coming from? The answer is designers like Hannah Custance, the color and materials design manager for Jaguar Land Rover. Her team's latest effort is also its magnum opus, the 2022 Range Rover. Although saddled with the expectations that comes with one of the automotive industry's classic nameplates, the all-new Range Rover is also a celebration of cutting edge manufacturing and fashion-forward materials selection. We sat down with Hannah at the L.A. Auto Show to find out more about color and materials designers, how she ended up in the industry, and advice she might have for young designers out there. It has been condensed for brevity. Autoblog: What does a color and materials design manager to do?Hannah Custance: I basically look after a team of designers who design finishes for every A surface on the car. So, that could be exterior finishes. It could be interior trim materials, soft materials, hard materials, chromes, metals, woods, ceramic – that's one of the new ones – anything you can kind of touch and see is color material design. Autoblog: How early in the design process does your team become involved.Hannah: Right at the very start. In fact, we look at materials that don't have a product assigned to them or a car assigned to them. So, it takes actually a very long time for us to get materials approved and fully validated. We have to find suppliers that are willing to work in automotive and our test standards are incredibly high, some of the highest in the industry.

Jaguar XJ220 leaps into Jay Leno's Garage

Having sadly canceled the C-X75 project and sat out today's hybrid hypercar race, it would be all too easy to forget about Jaguar as a supercar manufacturer altogether. But back in the early '90s, the British automaker didn't just play in the supercar game – it dominated it. The XJ220 was, for a time, the fastest car in the world. Jay Leno pays tribute in this latest video. Originally envisioned with a V12 engine and all-wheel drive, the XJ220 ultimately surfaced with a 3.5-liter twin-turbo V6 driving the rear wheels alone. None of that kept it from eclipsing the top speed achieved by every supercar that came before with a terminal velocity that didn't quite reach the 220 miles per hour initially promised, but came pretty darn close. The disappointment in the change of specification lead some to dismiss the XJ220 as a failure, but it was still the fastest thing on the road until another British supercar (in the form of the McLaren F1) took its place at the pinnacle of automotive bragging rights. Two decades later, Jaguar quite nearly drove down the same road when its initial plans for the C-X75 changed from an experimental turbine powertrain to a multi-charged inline-four. Only this time the Leaping Cat marque didn't put it into production at all, save for a few prototypes and movie props – which is a bit of a shame, and then some. Watching Jay speed down memory lane in the supercar that almost never was, we're glad that Jaguar still built the XJ220, and saddened that it never followed up with another groundbreaking supercar today. Related Video:

2018 Jaguar F-Pace S is a fun but thirsty travel companion

I love road trips. I've moved across the country twice, spending weeks living out of my car, eating granola bars and sucking down energy drinks like it was finals week all over again. I get a huge kick out of calculating fuel economy, stretching out tanks of gas or diesel until the low-fuel light begins to sear itself into my retinas. I try to take each and every one of our long-term vehicles on some such trip. Not long after our 2017 Jaguar F-Pace S arrives, my wife and I decided to see some family in Asheville, North Carolina, roughly 10 hours and 700 miles from our home in suburban Detroit. Now, I knew from the outset this was going to be a far different experience than our previous long-termer, a 2017 Jaguar XE diesel. I managed to eek out nearly 700 miles per tank, averaging 42 mpg over 2,000 miles with that car. But the 380-horsepower supercharged V6 in the F-Pace is rated at 18 city/23 highway with a combined rating of just 20 mpg. Not good, and — unlike the XE — I didn't think I could do much better without greatly altering my admittedly aggressive driving habits. Still, I wanted to take our blue bomber to the Blue Ridge Parkway, so onward I went. There were a few other things I was worried about over what was sure to be another 2,000-mile trip. The F-Pace's suspension was a bit stiff thanks to the sporty S trim. The 20-inch wheels don't help matters, though things could be worse (some people on staff wanted to get 22s). At least they look good. Still, the seats are comfortable and the radio is top-notch. LCD Soundsystem's latest album had just come out, so I put it on repeat and headed south. The first part of the trip was going to be both the most boring and the most economical. The roads in Michigan and Ohio are flat and straight. It isn't until you hit Kentucky and head into the Appalachian Mountains that things get interesting. Just set the radar cruise control and barrel down Interstate 75 with as much urgency as you dare. I forgot my Valentine One at home. The ride was firm but not as bad as I imagined it might be, at least once we got off of Michigan's pockmarked pavement. The F-Pace tracked straight and true, but I became acutely aware that the steering wheel itself was out of alignment, leaning just slightly to the left. Fuel economy was fine, but I was just meeting the EPA estimate, not beating it like I usually manage to do.