Russian luxury with a twist of African wood

Probably not many of you know who Russo-Baltique is, because they have been out of the picture quite some time. Now, they want to make a comeback and they have revealed a new prototype in this regard. We are dealing with a 2+2 coupe called Impression, and they have been working on it for four years now. The engine of this prototype is a 555 HP bi-turbo V12 (probably Mercedes origin), coupled to a 6 speed automatic gearbox and a pneumatic suspension.

The vehicle's wheelbase is of exactly 3 meters, its width of 1.88 meters and its height of 1.43 meters. All of this sitting on 22 inch wheels. Unfortunately (or not), Russo-Baltique is a very small company and can build only 2 or 3 Impression units per year, and the entire production is limited to a maximum of 10 or 15 cars. They will either hit it big, making everybody crazy with this extreme exclusivity, or they will flop big time, if the quality of their work is poor.

Let us analyse the Impression for a few moments. As far as the official information reveal, the car has rear-hinged doors and the dashboard is hand made of a one-piece exotic African tree trunk called Zebrano. The alternating black and white stripes are all natural, claims Russo-Baltique. The same material has been used for the steering wheel and the interior side panels. So, we could say that if you ended up in a pond with this car, you could dismount (or rip off) the dashboard and float your way to safety.

Somehow I don't see this Russian brand competing against Bentley or Rolls, not now and not even in 100 years. Then again, maybe they don't want to.