2017 Land Rover Range Rover Evoque Convertible: First Impressions
What a crazy idea: Let’s chop the top off of a perfectly good SUV and call it the world’s first luxury compact SUV convertible, and, oh yeah, it carries all the off-road goods of the Land Rover Range Rover Evoque, so it’s also able to wade through 20 inches of water. How strange. And I like it. The Evoque Convertible, which debuted at the 2015 Los Angeles Auto Show, is weird, funky and a droptop that has the right stuff be driven year-round — even in wintry conditions.
More Los Angeles Auto Show Coverage
Most all-wheel-drive convertibles are sporty cars like the Audi A5, BMW 4 Series, Jaguar F-Type or Porsche 911 that aren’t going to plow through snow or mud as easily as an SUV with its additional ground clearance — and definitely not as well as what a Land Rover convertible can negotiate.
The Evoque in regular form is also a luxury SUV with surprisingly sporty driving characteristics and a luxurious interior, so it has the potential to be good to drive unlike the Nissan Murano CrossCabriolet convertible SUV that occupied a similar space. Like the CrossCabriolet, sitting in the Evoque Convertible with the top down feels like you’re sitting in a bathtub with a high beltline. Top-down is also when the Evoque looks its best. The power-operated soft-top, with its layers of sound insulation, does a poor job of imitating the Evoque’s roofline when it’s up.
Retracting the roof reveals a fantastic configuration where the top folds into its own compartment leaving the cargo area untouched. And what a strange cargo area it is. The liftgate flips up to reveal a deep compartment that’s only usable by shoving items in from the back; it’s not open from the top like a traditional trunk, and it has a smaller, lower-to-the-ground opening than a regular SUV’s liftgate access.
The Evoque Convertible may be quirky and a perfect fit for a theoretical eccentric mountain-climbing sun lover, but I also see this being a hot ticket in cities like Chicago and New York City that get blasted with bad winters. The Evoque Convertible could negate the need to have a convertible weekend car and a daily driver.
