What recession?
What bailout?
Not on the northwest corner of Washington and Sepulveda boulevards.
Over at Sal Gonzales’ Culver City Volvo dealership last night, they held a coming-out party for a new model Volvo, a lusty upgrade from my 10-year-old non-Volvo.
Having apparently disobeyed President Obama’s injunction to cinch their belts tighter around their already slim middles, dozens of smiling, wide-eyed, curious, glass-clinking partygoers streamed into the strategically lighted showroom.
This was a major cultural event for car lovers, and it turned out you did not have to be an automobile maven.
The carefully cultivated mood at Culver City Volvo was as precise and appealing as an arcane mathematical calculation, meaning just right.
Near the centerpiece display was the young man charged with establishing a soothing mood, violinist Connor Vance of
Santa Monica High School. After listening to a few bars, I was ready to investigate a down payment.
Out on the showroom floor, they milled, as people do at soirees, noshing at this table, supping a proper libation at another.
Please Be Our Guest
For those of us who barely can distinguish between horse and the newest fangled motor carriage, the invitation convinced us that Mr. Gonzales’ dealership was the place to be between 5:30 and 8.
It read:
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Come meet Volvo's new 5-passenger crossover vehicle!
It's the "From Sweden with Löv Tour" party & you're invited!
Featuring the XC60 — the car that stops itself.
Wander through our multimedia exhibit and learn about
Volvo's love of safety, design and driving dynamics.
Meet the XC60 and kick the tires, fold down the seats,
and see what all the fuss is about.
Then get a demonstration of City Safety,
the world's first automatic braking system to come standard.
There will be plenty of hors d'ouevres and beverages, but come early —
the first 25 to arrive will receive a very special gift from Volvo.
Since I was at least the 26th person to arrive, identity of the “special gift” will have to remain one of the major mysteries of the universe, alongside why 80 degrees in the winter is cooler than 80 degrees in July.
When you are a journalist who is automotively illiterate, you search out a smart-looking person.
Except that Mr. Gonzales was too busy at the moment to opine, which turned out to be a lucky break for the journalist.
Blue, Blue, Blue, Blue
My search for automotive scholar ship led me outdoors, into the chill early-evening air, on the trail of a young woman whose blue garb was described to me more intricately than I can remember.
As she stepped out of the Car of the Evening, where she had been guiding curious customers through a series of short practice runs, I started to dash back toward Mr. Gonzales to thank him for being too busy to shmooze.
I didn’t realize he had invited Angelina Jolie to conduct testing
I cannot attest to the color of her outfit, though. I never got any farther than her amazingly electric blue eyes.
She said her name was Celesta Davis, which seemed plausible since it rhymes with celestial.
Ms. Davis is the co-manager of the “From Sweden with Lov” tour, and I didn’t even notice the Swedes, who manufacture Volvos, spell love without an “e.”
A Never-Before Heard Question
To the ineffable query of “what’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” Ms. Davis offered a likely answer.
“We are doing an event where we talk about the history of Volvo, we introduce, launch and unveil the new Volvo XC60.
“Out here,” she continued, as I shivered from the cold — or the heat — “we are doing City Safety demonstrations. This is a brand new technology Volvo is introducing. And it is only in this vehicle. It has a laser that is right behind the rear-view mirror. As you drive forward, it is monitoring about 20 feet in front of you. It is constantly evaluating. ‘How close are we?’ ‘How near are we to the vehicle in front of us?’
“If it senses that an accident is imminent with the vehicle in front of you, it will apply 100 percent of your brakes, after it has already pre-charged your brakes as you approach.
“We think that will help avoid or mitigate collisions that are happening. We have found that 75 percent of accidents happen under 20 miles per hour, and the system is active between 2 and 19 miles per hour.”
A Little Warm, or Am I Chilly?
While I was focusing on something blue in the air, Ms. Davis explained that the XC60, as I should have known, “is a smaller luxury crossover,” which actually characterized the condition of my eyes at the moment.”
She said the XC60 has 9.1 inches of ground clearance, “and you have a very muscular, aggressive lower half of the vehicle. So its weight is ideal for country, for dirt roads, those kinds of things. It also is very compact and sleek for city-driving. It is 182 inches long. It’s not tall and junky, like some of the older SUVs. Rather, it is going to give you more of a city feel,” which I had been experiencing all evening.
“It is the best of both wo[img]367|exact|||no_popup[/img]rlds,” Ms. Davis said. “You have great storage. Great space, especially for the passengers in the second row. You also get the climate package.You have four heated seats,” which meant we only had three to go.
“You can get dual-stage booster seats in the back row, if you have children. The XC60 is kind of a perfect size. A lot of space, yet you can get into small parking spaces, and it’s definitely not bulky.”
Besides two electric blue eyes, I also was intrigued by an apparently generic offer that is unique to Volvo — if you are going to purchase a new model, Volvo will fly two of you to the Scandanavian homeland, put you up in a hotel, give you time to drive around the countryside, and then fly you back to West L.A.
Clearly, this was an event with more than one dazzling attraction.
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Photos by Hank Porter
