1995 Land Rover Range Rover Vogue SE
VEHICLE DESCRIPTION
Completed in late 1994 and registered on 1 January the following year, this Range Rover Vogue SE is offered for sale as a very late example of the highly coveted first-generation ‘Classic’ model.
Presented in special-order Beluga Black with a Westminster Grey interior, it boasts a comprehensive service history that shows it passed to the Company Vehicles Department at Land Rover’s famous Solihull factory, and received its first service there in April 1995. Its second stamp, in July 1996, came from Vehicle Operations at the company’s Gaydon site, which suggests that the car was still part of the factory fleet at that point.
The service book then traces an almost continuous history through to the present day, via main dealers and independent specialists. Its current owner bought the Range Rover in 2011, the same year in which it was treated to a state-of-the-art multi-point LPG conversion.
Since then, it has been used sparingly while being meticulously cared for by Cirencester Classic & Vintage, which recommissioned it in 2016 following a period in storage. More recently, it carried out a major service in August 2024 that included the fitment of a new OEM air-suspension compressor and propshaft coupling.
Superbly presented throughout, this unrestored, highly original ‘soft dash’ Range Rover has great presence and offers an imperious driving position from its supremely comfortable seats. As a Vogue SE model, it is particularly well specified, with an extensive equipment list that includes air-conditioning, cruise control, and electrically operated, heated leather seats – complete with memory function.
It also features a genuine Land Rover tow pack, cruise control, a heated front screen, and an electric sunroof.
New Michelin tyres have recently been fitted, the four-speed automatic gearbox is ideallymatched to the 3.9-litre V8 engine, and the whole package perfectly embodies the enduring appeal of this timeless model.
MODEL HISTORY
Few cars define their class in the same way as the ground-breaking Range Rover, which was launched in 1970 as a more comfortable, practical and road-oriented sibling to the Land Rover.
The concept could trace its roots back to the Road Rover programme of the 1950s, but it wasn’t until the mid-1960s that work started in earnest. A team led by Gordon Bashford and Spen King devised a car that would combine a box-section chassis, four-wheel-drive transmission and Rover’s new 3.5-litre V8 engine.
They even came up with a basic body that was initially intended only for temporary use on a full-scale mock-up, but it proved so popular that it was refined by David Bache’s styling department into the final, instantly recognisable Range Rover shape.
The car was an immediate sales success and had no real rivals in terms of its all-round capabilities. Motor magazine said that ‘it does so many things so well … there are so few cars which even begin to compete’.
The Range Rover was officially available in only two-door form until 1981, when a four-door version was introduced. A year later, the option of an automatic gearbox was added. Initially a three-speed Chrysler unit, it was updated in 1985 to a four-speed ZF ’box.
The engine gained fuel injection in 1984 and was enlarged to 3.9 litres for 1990. Two years later, it was stretched to 4.2 litres for the luxuriously appointed, long-wheelbase LSE, and air suspension was introduced for the top-end models.
Eventually, in 1994, the second-generation Range Rover P38 was introduced, but it’s the original model that has long since become a motoring icon – a classless design that still looks equally at home whether it’s traversing the roughest off-road terrain, pulling up outside a stately home, or driving through a city.