Category Archives: NEW CARS

NEW CARS

Toyota Land Cruiser 300 Hybrid Brings Big Power—and Bigger Teasing—to Europe

Toyota has finally decided to let a few more people taste the forbidden fruit. The full-strength Land Cruiser 300 Hybrid—previously a Middle East exclusive—is heading to select Eastern European markets starting January 2026. Emphasis on select, because if you’re in Western Europe or North America, you’re still locked out of Toyota’s most serious SUV. Over here, the company insists you’ll be just fine with a Lexus LX or the smaller Land Cruiser 250. Thanks, Toyota.

Still, for those lucky markets getting the real deal, this isn’t just another compliance hybrid. The Land Cruiser 300 Hybrid is now the most powerful production Land Cruiser ever, and it wears that crown unapologetically.

Under the hood sits a twin-turbo 3.5-liter V6 paired with a single electric motor sandwiched between the engine and a 10-speed automatic transmission. The numbers tell the story: 457 horsepower and a meaty 790 Nm (583 lb-ft) of torque sent to all four wheels. Toyota says acceleration is up to 40 percent stronger than the non-hybrid 300 Series with the twin-turbo 3.3-liter diesel, and the electric motor fills in torque gaps while sharpening throttle response.

Yes, it can even creep around in electric-only mode—up to 30 km/h (19 mph), to be precise—powered by a nickel-metal hydride battery. No, this is not Toyota’s attempt at turning the Land Cruiser into a silent city cruiser. This is about control, response, and brute force applied more intelligently.

Crucially, Toyota didn’t sacrifice the Land Cruiser’s off-road credentials in the name of electrification. The battery is sealed in a waterproof housing, preserving the full 700 mm (27.6 inches) wading depth. According to Toyota, the hybrid system has been flogged across some of the harshest environments on the planet, and the company sounds confident it hasn’t dulled the SUV’s edge.

Electric power steering is now standard, promising better precision across mixed terrain, while all the familiar off-road hardware carries over: Multi-Terrain Select, Crawl Control, Downhill Assist Control, and the Multi-Terrain Monitor are all present and accounted for.

European buyers will be offered three trims—VX, ZX, and GR Sport—and every one of them sticks to a five-seat layout. If you were hoping for a third row, keep hoping. Of the trio, only the ZX gets a redesigned bodykit, but none of them feel stripped.

Even the base VX comes loaded, with 18-inch wheels, a power tailgate, full LED lighting, twin 12.3-inch displays, a 14-speaker JBL audio system, four-zone climate control, a heated steering wheel, power front seats, and a 1500-watt AC outlet. That’s a starter trim only by name.

Step up to the ZX and you’ll find Adaptive Variable Suspension, a five-mode drive selector, a head-up display, a kick-activated tailgate, and a rear limited-slip differential. Then there’s the GR Sport, which leans hard into its rugged image with unique bumpers, grille, fenders, and wheels, plus Toyota’s advanced e-KDSS system. It can decouple the anti-roll bars to maximize wheel articulation—exactly the kind of nerdy hardware Land Cruiser loyalists obsess over.

Toyota hasn’t said exactly which Eastern European countries will get the hybrid 300, nor how much it’ll cost there. For reference, pricing in the UAE starts at AED 389,900 (about $106,200), which should give you a rough idea of where expectations should land.

This also isn’t the Land Cruiser 300’s first brush with Europe. Since its 2021 debut, it’s been officially sold in markets like Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. Australia is next on the list, with deliveries slated for the first half of 2026, and Japan could follow after mild updates introduced in 2025.

For everyone else, the wait—and the frustration—continues. The Land Cruiser 300 Hybrid proves Toyota knows exactly how to modernize its most iconic off-roader without neutering it. The real question is why so many of us still aren’t allowed to buy one.

Source: Toyota

NEW CARS

Ferrari Tailor Made 12Cilindri

Ferrari’s Tailor Made program has always flirted with excess, but this latest creation—a one-off 12Cilindri developed exclusively for South Korea—doesn’t just push the envelope. It hand-weaves, lacquers, screen-prints, and sonifies it. If most bespoke Ferraris are haute couture, this one is closer to a traveling museum exhibition that just happens to have a naturally aspirated V-12 up front.

Called simply the Tailor Made 12Cilindri, this car is Ferrari at its most self-aware: a brand that knows its engineering is untouchable and therefore feels confident enough to let artists, designers, and cultural curators take the wheel aesthetically. The result is less about horsepower figures and more about storytelling—though the fact that the story is wrapped around one of Ferrari’s most important modern flagships makes it all the more compelling.

The project took nearly two years and spanned three continents. Maranello handled the hard bits, naturally, while COOL HUNTING®—the New York–based design and culture publication—acted as creative conductor. The real stars, however, are the South Korean artists whose work defines nearly every surface of the car. This isn’t a Ferrari with a theme; it’s a Ferrari that is the theme.

Start with the paint. Ferrari calls it Yoonseul, a newly developed transitional finish inspired by a Korean word that describes sunlight shimmering across water. It’s not marketing poetry either. The color genuinely shifts as light moves across the body, flowing from green to violet with blue undertones. One moment it recalls celadon ceramics rooted in Korean history; the next, it feels like neon reflections bouncing off the glass towers of modern Seoul. Ferrari has played with complex paints before, but this one feels unusually alive.

Inside, the collaboration becomes even more ambitious. Textile artist Daehye Jeong, known for her ethereal horsehair weaving, brings traditional Korean craft directly into the cabin. Her patterns appear in a newly developed 3D fabric used on the seats and flooring—the first time Ferrari has employed such a material. The same motif is screen-printed onto the glass roof, turning sunlight into a shifting pattern of shadows. Most striking of all, a handwoven horsehair artwork sits on the dashboard itself. This isn’t trim pretending to be art; it is art, permanently integrated into the car.

Ferrari’s engineers had to work closely with designers and suppliers to make that possible, and it shows. Nothing feels tacked on. The materials respect the car’s architecture, rather than fighting it.

Artist Hyunhee Kim takes over the visual identity. Known for her translucent reinterpretations of traditional Korean objects, she reimagines Ferrari’s most sacred icons—the Prancing Horse, the wheel caps, the Scuderia shields, even the long “Ferrari” nameplate—in a semi-transparent finish. It’s a bold move, and one Ferrari would never attempt on a production car, but here it works. The center tunnel inside carries the same translucent treatment, joined by a hand-crafted dedication plate rendered in traditional calligraphy.

Kim’s contribution even extends to the trunk, where she designed a custom case that doubles as luggage and houses a Ferrari key reworked in her signature visual language. It’s the kind of detail that feels excessive until you remember this is a car likely destined for climate-controlled storage anyway.

White, a color Ferrari usually treats cautiously, becomes a statement thanks to contemporary artist TaeHyun Lee. Drawing from traditional Korean lacquer techniques, Lee inspired a series of elements finished in brilliant white—including the brake calipers and the shift paddles. Yes, white brake calipers on a factory Ferrari are a first, and no, they don’t feel like a gimmick. Against the iridescent bodywork, they read as intentional punctuation marks.

Then there’s sound—visualized. The South Korean duo GRAYCODE (jiiiiin) translated the 12Cilindri’s V-12 soundtrack into a graphical waveform that’s subtly rendered across the bodywork using a darker variation of the same transitional paint. It’s a literal expression of the engine’s voice, frozen in motion, and it might be the most Ferrari idea of all: turning mechanical noise into visual drama.

What makes this Tailor Made 12Cilindri remarkable isn’t just the craftsmanship or the novelty of its materials. It’s Ferrari’s willingness to step back and let external creative voices reshape its most recognizable symbols. The company didn’t dilute its identity in the process—it reinforced it. This car still looks unmistakably like a Ferrari. It just happens to speak fluent Korean design language while doing so.

No price has been announced, and frankly, it doesn’t matter. This 12Cilindri isn’t about cost or collectability. It’s about Ferrari demonstrating that personalization, when taken seriously, can move beyond color palettes and stitching samples into something closer to cultural dialogue.

In a world where “bespoke” often means little more than a new shade of red, Ferrari just built a rolling argument for why craftsmanship, art, and engineering still belong in the same sentence. And yes, it still has a V-12. Some traditions are simply non-negotiable.

Source: Ferrari

NEW CARS

Apollo Evo: A Track-Only V12 Hypercar That Makes Subtlety a Casualty

Three years is an eternity in the hypercar world, but Apollo would argue the wait was the point. After first surfacing as a prototype, the Apollo Evo has finally emerged in production form—and it hasn’t mellowed with age. If anything, it’s gone further off the deep end. Limited to just 10 examples and designed strictly for the racetrack, the Evo is the logical, louder continuation of the already unhinged Intensa Emozione. The first customer car is now under construction, and the message is clear: this thing was never meant to blend in.

Freed from the burden of road legality, Apollo has designed the Evo with a singular focus on performance and spectacle. The result is a car that makes even the most extroverted creations from Pagani or Koenigsegg look almost conservative. This is not a machine interested in compromise—or subtlety.

At its core sits a carbon-fiber monocoque that tips the scales at just 165 kilograms (364 pounds). That’s a 10 percent weight reduction over the IE’s already feathery structure, while stiffness has increased by 15 percent. Apollo doesn’t just talk about weight savings in marketing terms—it engineers them into the foundation of the car.

Drape that tub in bodywork and the Evo’s intent becomes impossible to miss. Sharp LED lighting slices into the front and rear, while a towering roof scoop feeds air into the mechanical madness below. Out back, a massive diffuser and an active rear wing dominate the view. That wing isn’t just for show, either: Apollo claims it can generate a staggering 1,300 kilograms (2,866 pounds) of downforce at 320 km/h (200 mph). At that point, the Evo is theoretically capable of producing more downforce than its own curb weight—a stat that neatly sums up how far removed this car is from reality as most drivers know it.

The interior is no refuge from the insanity. Apollo has stripped away anything that doesn’t serve a direct function, exposing the car’s structural and mechanical elements rather than hiding them behind leather and trim. The dashboard itself doubles as a structural beam, and the control layout follows a logic dictated by track use, not convenience. This isn’t minimalism for aesthetic reasons—it’s functional brutality. The Evo doesn’t want to coddle its driver; it wants to involve them.

Then there’s the engine, and it’s the reason purists will pay attention. In an era increasingly dominated by turbochargers, hybrid systems, and silent electric propulsion, the Evo proudly sticks with a naturally aspirated 6.3-liter V12. Derived from Ferrari’s F140 engine family—the same lineage that powered cars like the F12 Berlinetta—it revs to 8,500 rpm and produces 800 horsepower and 564 lb-ft of torque (765 Nm). No turbo lag, no battery assistance—just displacement, revs, and noise.

Power is sent exclusively to the rear wheels through a six-speed sequential gearbox, reinforcing the Evo’s old-school, driver-first ethos. There’s no mention of all-wheel drive, torque vectoring, or electronic trickery designed to make things easier. The assumption here is that if you’re buying an Apollo Evo, you already know what you’re doing—or you’re willing to learn the hard way.

The rolling stock matches the aggression. Forged wheels measure 20 inches up front and 21 inches at the rear, wrapped in Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 R tires—the kind of rubber you choose when longevity is irrelevant and grip is everything. Combined with the Evo’s low mass, the numbers get serious quickly.

Despite its dramatic aero and V12 soundtrack, the Evo weighs just 1,300 kilograms (2,866 pounds). That power-to-weight ratio helps launch it to 100 km/h (62 mph) in just 2.7 seconds, with a claimed top speed of 335 km/h (208 mph). Those figures put it squarely in modern hypercar territory, but the way it gets there—naturally aspirated, rear-wheel drive, sequential gearbox—feels increasingly rare.

As exclusive as the hardware is, Apollo is pushing individuality even further. Every Evo will be a one-off, with each owner choosing their own combination of materials and finishes. Pricing starts at €3 million (about $3.5 million) before taxes, and first deliveries are expected in the first half of this year.

The Apollo Evo isn’t trying to be the future of performance cars. It’s a defiant celebration of excess, noise, and mechanical purity—a reminder that sometimes the most exciting answer to modern automotive trends is to ignore them entirely.

Source: AutoExpress