What is it?
The last time Jaguar revealed an estate version of the XF, four years had elapsed since the launch of the saloon. Flu pandemics come and go at a quicker rate.
This time round, with Gaydon’s impressive, investment-heavy playbook now on a metronomic footing, it’s two years on the nose. That’s progress. The model is a recognisable descendant of the first generation: still frumpily dubbed Sportbrake because, Jaguar being Jaguar, the car is ostensibly meant to prioritise appearance over practicality.
Really, of course, the maker wants it both ways and, thanks to the efforts of the styling department, that’s precisely what it gets. In the flesh, the wagon is a corker. There’s no special recipe here not already deployed on any number of rivals (the low, raked roofline; the high, chaste shoulder; the wrap-around lines; the tapered bottom), but it all colludes magnificently. And because it better conceals the saloon’s curiously long rear deck, it immediately stakes a credible claim as Jaguar’s best-looking non-sports car.
Gaydon doubtless sniffed the lifestyle potential of all this when the Sportbrake was still made of clay; hence those F-Type-cloned rear lights and the chrome exhausts. To their credit, the engineers accommodated all this curviness while still hollowing out a proper rectangular crypt of a boot.
True, there’s barely any more room in there than aboard the saloon – but its sides are so clean that you’ll convince yourself otherwise. And with the seatbacks folded impressively flat (another admirable internal target), the XF apparently boasts one of the longest loadspaces in its class.
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And we moan about China copying car designs...
I give you the 2011 Holden Commodore Wagon...even in red so you can't miss it
Petrol
Like the car but would like a 300PS petrol AWD. They have all the bits but for some reason will not put them together.
My opinions on Callum styled
My opinions on Callum styled Jags are well known - as usual this is bland, characterless and anonymous, it looks like something from a Chinese start up, not a 100 year old British manufacturer. Awful.