An icon of 80s bespoke performance design inspires the new TWR Supercat

This is the new TWR Supercat, a glorious homage to the racing Jaguars developed in the early 80s by Tom Walkinshaw Racing. TWR – a separate company founded in 2020 by Fergus Walkinshaw, Tom’s son – is hoping to build 88 examples of the Supercat, taking the spirit of the original wide-bodied racing machine to a new generation of enthusiasts and collectors. 

Designed by custom car specialist Khyzyl Saleem in collaboration with Magnus Walker, best known for his bespoke custom-build Porsches, the Supercat is unambiguously loud and lairy. The original race cars were based on Jaguar’s XJS, the lithe V12 powered coupé that replaced the E-Type in 1975. With seven built in total, they were very successful on circuits around the world inspiring Jaguar to build over 300 limited edition Le Mans versions of the production car, also fettled by Tom Walkinshaw and his team.

The Supercat has pedigree, but its wild looks are just as much inspired by the slammed, widened and spoiler-festooned aesthetics of custom culture. There were wide bodied XJS variants back in the day, for both road and track, from the likes of Lister and Koenig, and the newly minted TWR takes inspiration from them all. The signature XJS styling cues are all present and correct, from the custom twin-headlight set up of the race cars to the arched rear lights and ‘flying buttress’ C-pillars, here notched to allow airflow over the dramatic rear spoiler.

A supercharged V12 will provide around 600bhp to ensure the performance matches up to the looks, mated to a manual gearbox for authentic muscular, analogue performance. The edition of 88 is a nod to the TWR Jaguar XJR-9’s 1988 Le Mans win.

TWR Supercat, from £225,000 plus local taxes, TWRperformance.co.uk, @TWRperformance