2017 Bentley Bentayga: Up Close

Bentley’s first SUV, the 2017 Bentayga (ben-TAY-guh), won’t be delivered to U.S. buyers until June 2016, but we got an early look at a Chicago-area dealership, just one stop of many it’s making around the U.S.

Related: Bentayga: Bentley’s Fast, Luxurious First SUV

If you can identify a Bentley car, you’ll identify the Bentayga easily, because it shares some family attributes, most notably the prominent chrome grille in front. Creased quarter panels that form haunches mirror those of the Continental GT – in what Bentley says is the largest single piece of aluminum sheet metal in the automotive world.

The nose has some interesting features, including bisected headlights with the word Bentley debossed in the cross-bar, flanked by ring-shaped LED daytime running lights, the body-colored center disk of which hides motorized headlight washers. It would also be a good place to hide machine guns – if Aston Martin and Jaguar didn’t already have the James Bond franchise locked down.

My sole criticism – an old one – is that this model shares the Continental’s chromed plastic grille treatment. To be clear, nearly 100 percent of automotive grilles are made of plastic, but they don’t have to look plasticky, and these do. Coincidentally, the Bentley Mulsanne is one of few vehicles with a metal grille – heavy gauge steel, not just wire, but unfortunately the cost of that material and the steps needed to make it safe for pedestrians in a collision are prohibitive in anything but the flagship car.

Apart from taillights with Bentley B shapes in them, the rear end is uninspiring. The optional 22-inch wheels, on the other hand, are stunning. Standard wheels are “only” 20 inches.

The interior is what you should expect from a Bentley – ultra-luxurious, with quilted leather, genuine wood and metal. I wouldn’t have come up with the combination of tan, gray and brown, but someone more skilled than I made it work. The front seats are roomy, enough so that the wide, tall center console won’t be too intrusive for most – though this kind of thing drives some people positively batty.

The front seats have 22-way adjustment and the rear captain’s chairs have 18-way (only the bolster adjustments are left out). All four seats have heat, ventilation and massage functions. I scrutinized the instrument panel display and center touch-screen looking for signs of Audi – always a risk when brands share the same parent company (Volkswagen, in this case), and while there are similarities, they’re not glaring. The telltale sign is in the control system, which includes similar thumbwheels and buttons on the steering wheel.

It’s not a full-blown Audi Multi Media Interface with a center console knob and quadrant buttons, though. Instead, the 8-inch touch-screen has a knob on the right for things like zooming the map, but it also allows pinching and swiping motions. Thankfully, there are no stupid touch-sensitive buttons like we often see, even in some luxury SUVs (Land Rover being one).

Where you might have expected an MMI knob is instead a standard Drive Dynamics Mode knob that lets you select among eight modes for different circumstances. Much like Porsche’s Cayenne (especially the first generation), Bentley has committed to off-roading with this SUV, a la most Land Rovers. There’s a standard front skid plate, and the air suspension varies ground clearance and can be controlled by dedicated buttons as well as by the DDM knob, which also varies accelerator sensitivity, transmission response, shock absorber firmness, active stabilizer bar response and more. The modes are Sport, Bentley (the company’s choice), Comfort, Custom (driver’s pre-configurable choice) and icons representing snow, loose surfaces, mud and sand.

The backseat is roomy and comfortable, and the demonstration Bentayga was equipped with a customized Android tablet on each of the front seatbacks. Measuring 10.2 inches, the tablets are tied into the front media system but are Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and 4G capable.

Unfortunately, the vehicle on hand didn’t have the optional third-row seat, which also replaces the second-row captain’s chairs with a three-seat bench. An interesting panel – diamond-stitched leather on the cabin side, carpet on the cargo side – separates the two spaces. When the second row is power-folded, it extends the cargo floor forward and spans the two folded seats, covering the center console.

The cargo area is modest in size, due in part to the liftgate’s shallow, wagon-like rake. Buttons back here fold the second-row seats, and others lower the vehicle’s suspension to ease accessing its rather high load floor. Sadly, the optional “event seat,” which provides tailgate-style seating, wasn’t present either. Neither were many other expensive add-ons we’re going to enjoy exploring and perhaps mocking in the future.

One we’ll probably never see in person is the optional Mulliner Tourbillon clock by Breitling, which replaces the standard clock in the center of the dashboard. Machined from solid gold, it will cost 150,000 euros – that’s $170,107.50 based on today’s exchange rate. Did I mention the Bentayga itself will start at $229,100?

Wristwatch snobs, who disdain electric timepieces, will be pleased to learn that the Tourbillon has traditional mechanical movement – but with an electric motor behind it to rotate the entire clock occasionally, keeping it wound. I hope that doesn’t violate their sensibilities.