The Jaguar XJR-15 was the world’s first fully carbon-fibre road car.

Conceived by Jaguar’s sporting division in collaboration with Tom Walkinshaw Racing, the production of the car was seen as a way to get a fully specced endurance racer into the hungry market for very wealthy revheads. Only 53 were made between 1990 and 1992, each selling for close to a million US dollars.

True exotica

Mechanically they were close to the Le Mans-winning Jaguar XJR-9, with a 450 HP V12 engine, and the bodies were styled by Peter Stevens – who later went on create the brutalist lines of the McLaren F1.

The Jaguar XJR-15 is one of those supercars destined for climate-conditioned hangers, out of the prying eyes of the great unwashed and the tax man – but thanks to the web we can enjoy its uncompromising purposefulness from a distance.

We wonder how much they would go for now.

The mind bogles

[Via influx magazine]