2015 Porsche Macan Is Even Better Than The Real Thing

TWO COWS standing in a field. One says to the other Are you worried about Mad Cow Disease. The other replies No, I'm a squirrel. I often think similar of car-makers, when one brand promises success in a sector where everyone else has failed. In 2002 the SUV market was still getting used to its new nomencalture: hitherto it had always been 4x4 or off-roader, or sometimes Jeep. Porsche changed all that. Where Range Rover was dutifully carrying hunters toward grouse, and The Duke of Edinburgh around his estate (possibly the same thing), in came the Cayenne with an adversion to rocks and an predilection for speed. Cheshire and Chelsea loved them, and Porsche became associated with another acronym: WAG.

These were pre-Kardashian days, when television's Big Brother was still a novelty and the financial crash inconceivable. How we ridiculed Porsche! We were so obsessed with rational, plausible products that represented easy extrapolations of our preconceptions, that the appeal of a sporty 4x4 was initially overlooked. But the Cayenne was a hit. Through it we learned an important lesson: build it and they will come (hang on, that sounds familiar). Being desirable is reason enough to warrant development. Heart over head, and all that. So what could be more desirable than a smaller, faster, sportier, sexier Cayenne? Enter the Macan.

Let's start at the front. At first, the graphics fool you into believing you are looking at the scion of a 911, lamps poised dexter et sinister to a low nose bearing  Zuffenhausen heraldry. Then you see that this is atop a sedimentary layer of inlets, splitters, fogs and black-out, all keeping as quiet as possible so that your eyes don't get distracted. The cleverly sculpted fender wraps over the lamp, where it is sunk beneath a crease to give the impression of a separate volume a la you-know-what. Another crease further inboard helps lift the centre-line so that the bonnet has the necessary engine clearance for pedestrian safely. 



The body-side is another game of seeing how high the main design theme can start. Plain, geometric carbon inserts and black-out lift the main light-catcher above knee-height, but the killer feature here is just how phat that haunch is, spilling out more than any non-911 has dared. Clever, too, is that the roofline remains quite level, rather than dipping like a coupe, providing more rear head-room inside (which is a triumph, interior fans). The fast rear-screen and metal bustle give tremendous accelerative shunt to the car, finished by tail-lights that give the finger to Mercedes, who invented, then dropped the whole rib thing long ago. 

This is the first new car in a long time that I would re-mortgage for. Bold, voluptuous, simple, detailed. Porsche has absolutely nailed it. In some ways the styling looks even more comfortable on this package than the 911. That the Porsche Macan is too heavy, too expensive, too thirsty seems to not really matter when it converts so ably the aesthetic currency of the 911 into a more usable proposition. Everything you could ever want? You'd be nuts to buy anything else.