As fate would have it, Maybach sells more cars as a sub-brand of Mercedes that it did when it was a standalone automaker. Something that the ultra-luxury outfit won’t ever do, however, is to work its magic on a small car.
In hindsight, it would be preposterous to affix the Maybach emblem to something like the A-Class or CLA. Remember that Aston Martin experiment called the Cygnet? Not even the well-heeled flocked to buy a Toyota iQ in drag, which is why only a few hundred examples were built over the course of two years. Plainly put, it was a disaster from a sales perspective.
That’s one of the reasons why smart will never go ultra-luxury, albeit we can only dream, can’t we? One such dreamer is Jan Peisert, who goes by the name of Peisert Design on the WWW. Known in the car-loving enthusiast's realm for its rendering of the Mercedes-AMG Project One, Jan now took to his Photoshop skills to create an extremely lavish smart.
Starting with the fortwo in Electric Drive guise as a canvas, Peisert then applied a larger-than-life treatment consisting of huge wheels, an exaggeratedly wide grille flanked by thin headlights, a little bit of carbon fiber trim, and a rear end adorned with a full-width light strip.
As ludicrous as the exterior is, the cabin outshines it tenfold. A mix of genuine wood, real metal detailing, and acres of diamond-stitch leather upholstery is how the Peisert smart rolls, digital instrument cluster included. All in all, this fellow is a legitimate flight of wonder.
Introduced in 2014, the third-generation smart fortwo shares many bits and pieces with the Renault Twingo III. But as opposed to the French sibling, the smart is also available as an EV. At €21,940 without accounting for government incentives, the fortwo Electric Drive has a 160-kilometer range to its name. The 17.6 kWh pack sends its juice to an 81 PS (60 kW and 160 Nm (118 lb-ft) electric motor, with standstill to 100 km/h (62 mph) doable in 11.5 seconds.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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