Inside Bugattis Secret W16 Destrier Hypercar

Bugatti said goodbye to the W16 with the Mistral, then quietly handed one last customer a better farewell than anyone else gets: a one-off hypercar called the Destrier. It was built around the same 8,0-litre quad-turbo architecture, but wrapped in a body that looks like a missile.

The car uses race hardware as it is based on the track-only Bolide, yet the finished form seems like a Bugatti designer spent a long evening cutting away everything that looked too busy or too obvious. The result is cleaner than the race-y Bolide.

Destrier is not a car you understand with your head, it is a car you feel with your heart. The Bolide gave us the most extreme proportions we have ever created, and by freeing them from the Bolide’s relentless pursuit of downforce, we let them speak as pure sculpture
– Frank Hely, Bugatti design director

A one-off with racecar bones

The Destrier is the third unique commission under Bugatti’s Programme Solitaire, following the Brouillard and the Veyron-inspired F.K.P Hommage. Those earlier cars were based on the roadgoing Chiron. This one goes a step further and uses the track-only Bolide as its foundation, which places it higher in Bugatti’s hierarchy.

Under the bodywork lives the same basic hardware that gives the Bolide its reputation as one of the wildest machines Molsheim has ever signed off. The engine is the familiar quad-turbocharged 8,0-litre W16 that produces 1 177 kW. Bugatti has not published acceleration or top-speed claims for the Destrier. The car exists less as a numbers exercise than as a final flourish for a powertrain that everyone had already filed under history.

That history was supposed to have closed with the Mistral, the roadster Bugatti used to mark the end of the W16 line. Instead, the Destrier gives that engine one more chapter, and on one owner’s terms only. The Mistral was the public send-off; this is the private encore.

A new shape

The name comes from the destrier, the prized warhorse of medieval knights. The Destrier keeps the Bolide’s stance but strips away much of its overt aero addenda. The huge wings and aggressive cooling hardware are gone. In their place is a more sculpted body with smoother surfaces and a much cleaner surface from nose to tail.

Bugatti says the car stands 1 metre tall, which makes it the lowest Bugatti ever created apart from the Bolide itself. The Bolide measures 995 mm, so the gap is tiny.

The front end is now led by a narrower C-shaped profile element that folds into the nose and points toward the wide horseshoe grille. Slim LED headlights sit on narrow fenders, the hood is vented, and there is a large roof scoop. Behind the front wheels, deep channels carve air through the body. At the rear, the tyres are left partly exposed, the taillights are slim, and the exhaust exits through four large tailpipes. That ‘cross-hairs’ design motif of the taillamps looks pretty darn cool, too.

The wheels are custom five-double-spoke alloys, not the Bolide’s 18-inch centre-lock items. Bugatti fits 20-inch rims at the front and 21-inch rims at the rear. The whole car wears Sapphire Celeste paint with a sparkling finish, polished aluminium accents and tinted carbon-fibre sections. Even the brightwork in the engine bay gets special treatment, with a hand-hammered surface that nods to knightly armour – just to keep the theme going.

A more civilised cabin

Inside, the Destrier has a far more usable cabin than the race-ready Bolide. Ambre Voyageur brown leather and nubuck bring warmth to the cabin, while the dashboard and door cards use a 3D-knitted textile threaded with copper. Hammered metal finishes carry the motif through the interior, so the cabin feels bespoke.