This special G-Class is less Chelsea, more tractor - and I love it

The latest special edition G-Class puts a retro-inspired spin on the firm's flagship 4x4 If I had all the money, I don’t think I’d buy a new Mercedes-Benz G-Class. It’s a fine car, of course, but I don’t have the gall to mis-space the letters of my gel numberplates, and big alloys and low-profile tyres on serious 4x4s just look wrong to me. But hello, here comes the new ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ special edition G-Class, which comes in two choice period colours, receives orange indicator repeaters, wears a black grille and light surround and runs on trad-looking 18in five-spoke wheels wearing chunky 265/60 R18 tyres. What a difference some very small details can make. It has gone from a car that I’d dismiss very easily to one about which I think: ‘Don’t wrap it – I’ll drive it home.’ I’ve just been on the G-Class configurator (an activity plenty of people avoiding deadlines will be familiar with. There’s now a Morgan Supersport one, by the way), and it’s true that you can already spec classic-style ‘Manufaktur’ non-metallic colours – like sand, a dark green and two blues – on the G-Class. You can colour the wheel arches and roof in black too. But still those options don’t quite transform the car like these limited-edition details do. For one, I think the new paint colours are rather more ‘period’ (Mercedes even calls them ‘nostalgia colours’), but the rest is all about those three changes: repeaters, grille, wheels. Mostly the 18in wheels; the minimum standard wheel size on a new G-Class is otherwise 20in. Is there another car to which three such small options could make such a grand difference? I don’t think so. Retro design details on modern cars usually look like anomalies, but here, because the latest G-Class design is sufficiently close to the original anyway, it’s the other way around. It’s a typically specified modern G-Class, in those satin greys that are so popular, and on the big 22in wheels that AMG models wear, that looks like a restomod – an elderly gentleman dressed in athleisure wear. Some modifiers and restomodders of original Land Rover Defenders make similar mistakes, fitting weird LED headlight units, modern paint finishes and wheels that look far, far too big. The ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ G-Class is our old gent slipping back into his brogues and tweed. He looks right again. I feel like we’ve talked around this retro subject before. Many car designers don’t like retro designs, because they’re in the business of making new things, not rehashing old ones. But the G-Class isn’t a new car and some of the aesthetic options you can put on one feel like that white rendering and grey window framing people seem intent on putting on previously characterful houses. Fashion aside, I think this new G-Class just looks more authentic, more fit for purpose. If one is going to have a big 4x4, why fit wheels and tyres that don’t suit off-roading and paint it such that you wouldn’t dare take it near a thorn bush? In the past year, I’ve spent time in a new Land Rover Defender 130 on big, shiny black alloys and with satin black paint and in an Ineos Grenadier with neither of those things. The Defender is the better car to drive: it’s calmer, more relaxing, more comfortable, quieter, brilliantly capable off road and tows for Britain. But I felt sufficiently less conspicuous in the Grenadier that, spec for spec, it’s the one I’d have. Maybe I’ve never reached a stage in life where I don’t care what other people think. But cars, particularly those bought for a want and not a need, do say something about their owners, don’t they? This G-Class looks like it has been specced and built and is owned for the reasons it was first intended. And I’d rather drive that, even if it’s a slightly ‘worse’ car than a regular one, which it might be. Those tyres will probably give it less directional stability and certainly squidgier steering, and as they’re probably heavier might not even improve the ride. Does that make me shallow? Oh well. The only part of a ‘modern’ G-Class I think I prefer in fact is the interior grab handle, because of the big ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ script on this special edition. I couldn’t have that written so close to a stereo that would spend at least 70% of its time playing absolute 1980s bangers.

May 18, 2025 - 12:38

This special G-Class is less Chelsea, more tractor - and I love it

The latest special edition G-Class puts a retro-inspired spin on the firm's flagship 4x4

If I had all the money, I don’t think I’d buy a new Mercedes-Benz G-Class.

It’s a fine car, of course, but I don’t have the gall to mis-space the letters of my gel numberplates, and big alloys and low-profile tyres on serious 4x4s just look wrong to me.

But hello, here comes the new ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ special edition G-Class, which comes in two choice period colours, receives orange indicator repeaters, wears a black grille and light surround and runs on trad-looking 18in five-spoke wheels wearing chunky 265/60 R18 tyres.

What a difference some very small details can make. It has gone from a car that I’d dismiss very easily to one about which I think: ‘Don’t wrap it – I’ll drive it home.’

I’ve just been on the G-Class configurator (an activity plenty of people avoiding deadlines will be familiar with. There’s now a Morgan Supersport one, by the way), and it’s true that you can already spec classic-style ‘Manufaktur’ non-metallic colours – like sand, a dark green and two blues – on the G-Class.

You can colour the wheel arches and roof in black too. But still those options don’t quite transform the car like these limited-edition details do.

For one, I think the new paint colours are rather more ‘period’ (Mercedes even calls them ‘nostalgia colours’), but the rest is all about those three changes: repeaters, grille, wheels. Mostly the 18in wheels; the minimum standard wheel size on a new G-Class is otherwise 20in.

Is there another car to which three such small options could make such a grand difference? I don’t think so. Retro design details on modern cars usually look like anomalies, but here, because the latest G-Class design is sufficiently close to the original anyway, it’s the other way around.

It’s a typically specified modern G-Class, in those satin greys that are so popular, and on the big 22in wheels that AMG models wear, that looks like a restomod – an elderly gentleman dressed in athleisure wear.

Some modifiers and restomodders of original Land Rover Defenders make similar mistakes, fitting weird LED headlight units, modern paint finishes and wheels that look far, far too big. The ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ G-Class is our old gent slipping back into his brogues and tweed. He looks right again.

I feel like we’ve talked around this retro subject before. Many car designers don’t like retro designs, because they’re in the business of making new things, not rehashing old ones.

But the G-Class isn’t a new car and some of the aesthetic options you can put on one feel like that white rendering and grey window framing people seem intent on putting on previously characterful houses.

Fashion aside, I think this new G-Class just looks more authentic, more fit for purpose. If one is going to have a big 4x4, why fit wheels and tyres that don’t suit off-roading and paint it such that you wouldn’t dare take it near a thorn bush?

In the past year, I’ve spent time in a new Land Rover Defender 130 on big, shiny black alloys and with satin black paint and in an Ineos Grenadier with neither of those things.

The Defender is the better car to drive: it’s calmer, more relaxing, more comfortable, quieter, brilliantly capable off road and tows for Britain. But I felt sufficiently less conspicuous in the Grenadier that, spec for spec, it’s the one I’d have.

Maybe I’ve never reached a stage in life where I don’t care what other people think. But cars, particularly those bought for a want and not a need, do say something about their owners, don’t they?

This G-Class looks like it has been specced and built and is owned for the reasons it was first intended. And I’d rather drive that, even if it’s a slightly ‘worse’ car than a regular one, which it might be.

Those tyres will probably give it less directional stability and certainly squidgier steering, and as they’re probably heavier might not even improve the ride. Does that make me shallow? Oh well.

The only part of a ‘modern’ G-Class I think I prefer in fact is the interior grab handle, because of the big ‘Stronger than the 1980s’ script on this special edition.

I couldn’t have that written so close to a stereo that would spend at least 70% of its time playing absolute 1980s bangers.