Your Favourite Luxury Car Maker is Getting Into Fashion

The Range Rover house in Whistler looks like a place Gwyneth Paltrow would stay during a ski holiday: all soaring windows overlooking the Coast Mountains and immaculate cream-coloured couches. And although it feels as though Ms. Paltrow could come floating through the heavy wooden doors at any moment, the house (which is a, well, roving global concept that pops up in spots like Sydney, Miami and Saint-Tropez) is instead full of Range Rover clients. For them, the brand is not just a car to drive, but a lifestyle to embody. Invited guests who drop by the House can sip on local BC wines, attend a sound bath mediation session or try on some Bulgari jewellery.

Whistler’s Range Rover House also provided an opportunity to launch the Range Rover Sport SV Gaea Curation in Canada. There’s no shortage of luxury details here, like the silver birch wooden finishes and satin-y Green Terre Matte bespoke exterior paint finish. And that aspirational vibe and exacting eye for detail isn’t limited to the cars.

For a start, there’s the London Collection—the automaker’s first foray into luxury apparel. Not to be mistaken with your standard dealership merch, this lifestyle lineup is subtle in its branding (in fact, the only place you’ll spot the words “Range Rover” is on a zipper pull inspired by the rotary dials within the car’s cabin) and elevated in its execution. The eight pieces that make up the collection—which spans men’s, women’s and home—are crafted in Europe, blending Italian and UK craftsmanship.

Range Rover London Collection About Town Silk Scarf, $795

The silk-twill scarves are printed in Lake Como, and hand-finished in the UK. The minimalist, modern motif is a subtle nod to the rounded, elegant lines of a Range Rover. The men’s and women’s bomber jackets are reversible and meticulously hand-quilted by one of the remaining clothing manufacturers in Manchester. Then there are the home items, including wool-cashmere blankets woven on Italian jacquard looms and miniature (and adorable) sculpt models of a Range Rover that would not be out of place on a bookshelf full of Assouline titles.

Range Rover London Collection Soho Chic Jacket, $2,650

The through line here is restraint. Range Rover has long taken a “less is more” approach to design, and the London Collection is also made in limited quantities. Guests at Range Rover House had the opportunity to order their pieces on the spot, and the collection is also available online. But once it’s gone, it’s gone.

Kimberley Panton, apparel designer at Jaguar Land Rover, says that the development of the brand and its products “is an exercise in refinement and reductionism,” adding that the brand has been known for its “breathtaking modernity” since its inception in 1970.

Of course, no visit to a Ranger Rover House would be complete without getting behind the wheel—or at least into the passenger seat. I opt for the latter. My driver, Alanna Carter (who happens to race cars for a living), tells me that in her view, the luxury of a Ranger Rover comes from the fact that “everything makes sense, everything is very intuitive.” As she says this, the car’s suspension lifts into off-roading mode as if by magic, just as the mountain road opens before us. Everything makes sense, indeed.