Carte Blanche (Bentley Motors Ltd Edition)

By: FSWL team

Published:
2011-04-26

Bentley Motors create a luxury limited edition of the new James Bond book, Carte Blanche (2011).
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From Sweden with Love was invited to the UK launch of 'Carte Blanche' at St. Pancras International in London on 25th May 2011. Read our report from the launch.
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Official book description:
Thousands will die. It is not known where, or how, or who is behind the threat.

007 is given carte blanche to do anything necessary to protect his country, but there is no blank slate when innocent lives are at stake. The only suspects are career killers with no care for civilian victims.

Bond must find out who is paying them, what they plan, and stop them. And he has five days to do it.

To celebrate the release of Carte Blanche, the new James Bond book by Jeffery Deaver, on 26 May 2011, publisher Hodder & Stoughton has partnered with Bentley Motors to create an exclusive Bentley special edition: the ultimate luxury edition of the highly anticipated new James Bond adventure. The 500 limited edition copies are available for pre-order from today, Tuesday 26 April 2011, exactly a month before publication date. Huge worldwide demand is anticipated for this new special edition after Bentley’s collaborative bespoke book for the previous Bond novel, Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks, sold out within days.

Ian Fleming always admired the stately beauty of the Bentley and, as a result, James Bond owned three Bentleys over the course of the 14 original Bond novels. In Carte Blanche, award-winning thriller writer Jeffery Deaver reunites Bond with this classic marque. In this contemporary adventure, the agent will be behind the wheel of the beautifully sculpted and sophisticated new Bentley Continental GT.

The design team at Bentley worked closely with Hodder & Stoughton to capture the spirit of Bond and Bentley. A team of seven designers submitted proposals for the edition and the final design came from Bentley Senior Designer Brett Boydell. He comments: “As a designer it doesn’t get much better than a brief of ‘Carte Blanche’! The design features radical concepts that we feel reflect the name of the book, the ideas inherent in the Bond legacy, and the design principles we are passionate about.”

This special edition links the legendary hero with the iconic automobile in the most spectacular way. Each copy of the special edition is custom-produced to Bentley’s exacting standards and arrives inside a stunning metal case. The result is a striking and unique collector’s item. The special edition is strictly limited to 500 copies worldwide at a price of £1,000 each. They will be available to pre-order worldwide through www.007carteblanchebentley.com. The editions will be delivered after publication date.

THE DESIGN:
The case of the Bentley special edition is inspired by the deserts of Dubai – one of the exotic locations Bond finds himself in within the new novel – and the new Bentley Continental GT, Bond’s car of choice in the book.

Like the exterior of the GT, the case is made from polished aluminum, giving it a seamless and aerodynamic shape. More sculpture than car, it evokes the GT’s signature outline, its metal skin making it look like the car has risen from the desert sand. To ensure the finished case meets Bentley’s renowned standards of quality, an automotive supplier was employed to create the case to automotive standards using a specially commissioned machine.

In deference to the title Carte Blanche, the book itself is bound in white Nappa leather, the same outstanding grade of leather used in a Bentley’s interior, mimicking the interior of the GT with its contrast of white leather trim and Pillar Box red edging. The title, author’s name and the familiar wings of the Bentley logo are carefully embossed into the front and foil-blocked onto the spine. The text is printed in two colours, black and red, on sumptuous ivory paper, with endpapers of a matching red leather. The pages are expertly cut and trimmed to reflect the handcrafted techniques of the Bentley construction process. As with the other details of the special edition, the colours are carefully selected from the Bentley range. The book sits on a base of black anodised aluminium, chosen not to mark the white leather.

In one last twist, playing on the idea of an agent being given Carte Blanche, is one of the most dramatic features of the design: a die-cut bullet hole that pierces pages of the book. Hidden within the pages is a single polished 9mm bullet, individually marked with a number distinct to each copy, making the edition truly unique.

Brett Boydell adds: “Bond destroys as well as he creates and saves. It was this element I needed to convey in my design. The reader has the excitement of finding the bullet housed in the centre of the pages with the text positioned so that the reading experience is undisturbed. I hope they find the book as exciting to hold and look at as the unfolding drama itself.”

• Ian Fleming Publications Ltd is the Fleming family owned company that owns the copyright of the James Bond books: www.ianfleming.com

• For further information about Jeffery Deaver, visit: www.jefferydeaver.com

About Bentley Motors:
• Brett Boydell, Senior Interior Designer at Bentley Motor Cars, studied at Coventry University in Transport Design and graduated in 2001. He joined Bentley for a six month placement in 2000 in which time he designed a show car interior for the Arnage RL. Since then has continued to work in the Interior team under Robin Page and Dirk Van Braeckel on cars such as Bentley Azure, Brooklands and Continental Supersports. Also oversees the design side of Mulliner features and Branded Goods

• For more information about Bentley Motors, visit: www.bentleymotors.com

THE JAMES BOND BOOKS:
• Over 100 million Bond books have been sold (and over half the world’s population has seen a Bond film)

• Ian Fleming wrote 14 James Bond books: Casino Royale (1953), Live_and_Let_Die (1954), Moonraker (1955), Diamonds are Forever (1956), From Russia With Love (1957), Dr. No (1958), Goldfinger (1959), For Your Eyes Only (1960), Thunderball (1961), The Spy Who Loved Me (1962), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1963), You Only Live Twice (1964), The Man with the Golden Gun (1965) and Octopussy & The Living Daylights (1966).

• Fleming's other works include the children's favourite, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1964), which was made into a film and stage musical, The Diamond Smugglers (1957) and a collection of travel writings called Thrilling Cities (1963)

• Charlie Higson is author of the Young Bond books which are published by Puffin.

• Samantha Weinberg, writing as Kate Westbrook, is the author of The Moneypenny Diaries

• Other previous authors of official James Bond novels include Kingsley Amis, John Gardner, Raymond Benson and Sebastian Faulks, whose book became the publisher’s fastest selling hardback fiction title

• All of Ian Fleming’s original James Bond books are published by Penguin in the UK and the US

Editor's note:
Bentley Motors was also behind a special limited collectors' edition of the previous James Bond novel - Devil May Care (2008) - written by Seabstian Faulks.

Order the luxury Bentley Motors special limited edition of Carte Blanche:

www.007carteblanchebentley.com

Tags:

#carte_blanche

#jeffery_deaver_novels

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