Lotus has a long and illustrious history stretching back more than 60 years, its back catalogue containing some of the finest road and racing cars ever built. But it’s 1996 that we’re interested in here, the year that saw the Elise – one of the company’s most successful models of all time – go on sale. Named after Elisa Artioli, then-chairman Romano Artioli’s granddaughter, it stayed true to Colin Chapman’s ethos of lightness and simplicity – and few cars made before or since have delivered a driving experience with this level of purity.
Motoring magazines showered the Elise with plaudits, with Autocar calling it “the most technologically daring Lotus road car since the original Elite”. Styled by Julian Thompson, the Elise combined a lightweight GRP body with an advanced bonded and extruded aluminium chassis that was the work of chief engineer, Richard Rackham. Power came from Rover’s 1.8-litre K-Series engine, and while 118bhp seemed a modest output, it could propel the featherweight roadster to 60mph in just 5.5 seconds. But the outright performance wasn’t really the point, the supremely agile and responsive handling being what delighted anyone lucky enough to drive one. The spartan cabin made it seem all the more focused, with all of this ability costing just £18,995.
More power and speed would arrive,
