Discovering the Origins of the Post-War Bentley

The Silver Shadow and T-series achieved rare success in automobile history. Now comes a phenomenal book that documents everything leading up to the production of these variation models.

text:Hiromi TAKEDA
Translation: Mako Ayabe and Michael Balderi

The Silver Shadow, manufactured by Bentley’s previous partner, Rolls-Royce, from 1965 to 1980, and its Bentley version, the T-series, were long selling models that achieved remarkable success in their time.
The Silver Shadow/T-series is now well established as a classic. Surprisingly little seems to be known about the true nature of these models, however. Now, a terrific reference book for both models has arrived in Japan to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of the most ardent Bentley enthusiasts. The R-R Silver Shadow and the Bentley T, as well as the personal models that developed from them, such as the Corniche and Camargue, are fully explained in this excellent book.
Among the many great things which feature in this book, the development story is definitely worth mentioning here. In fact, this volume contains a wealth of such stories, including those about the first prototype of the Silver Shadow/T series, the ‘Tibet', the second prototype, the ‘Burma', and the prototype of the Corniche, the two-door personal coupé that formed the basis of the Corniche series, the ‘Korea'. It explains the development of these prototypes with rare photos taken behind closed doors. These include photographs of the 'Korea' coupé, a modernised version of the Park Ward 'Chinese Eye', built during the S3 Continental era, and of the prototype built by John Blatchley, R-R's chief stylist at the time of the minor change to the R-R Silver Shadow II / Bentley T2 - all of which are probably new to even the most knowledgeable Bentley enthusiasts. This alone is enough to make the book a worthwhile read.
It also covers the history of each of the coachbuilt models based on the Silver Shadow/T-Type, and includes a restoration guide, along with reference prices for classic cars. This is definitely a completist’s storybook that captures the entire history of both models.

Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow / Bentley T-Series
Author: Malcolm Bobbit
Publisher: Veloce Books
Pages: 208
Language: English

This is a revised version of an article that appeared in Flying B No 003 (2010). The information provided here was accurate at the time of publication.