Guided Tour of the Aston Martin Rapide

When the Aston Martin Rapide made its debut at the 2009 Frankfurt Motor Show, it became the first production four-door Aston Martin. Those four doors open in the company's trademark "swan-wing" style, which means they lift slightly up for easy access, as opposed to dramatically up like a Lamborghini or Mercedes gullwing. The car seats four adults in comfort and luxury, with a trunk big enough for their stuff -- including, according to the company, skis. All this rear space comes from the engine being front mid-mounted, as opposed to the rear engines of other four-door sports cars like the Porsche Panamera.

The Aston Martin Rapide engine is the same 6-liter V12 found in the Aston Martin DB9 coupe and Volante models. In the Rapide, as in the DB9, the hand-built engine puts out 477 hp and 443 lb-ft of torque. The Touchtronic 2 six-speed automatic with paddle shifters that's optional in the DBS is standard equipment for the Rapide, and it moves the car from 0-60 mph in 5.1 seconds. Top speed for the four-door sports sedan is a quite respectable 190 mph. The car is the first Aston Martin to be designed after being spun out of Ford Motor Company's orbit in 2007, and is the first to be built at the Aston facility in Austria.

While Aston Martin is known for its hand-built engines, hand-assembled cars, and hand-stitched seats, the passengers often get short shrift in the experience equation, especially if they get crammed in the tiny back seats. Not so for the Aston Martin Rapide. The interior was designed to give rear passengers clear front and side views, plus face-level heating and air conditioning. The transparent roof is steeply sloped, so tall passengers might want to call shotgun. If the rear seats happen to be empty, they fold flat electronically, at the push of a button, to more than double the trunk's capacity.