Volvo moves up the design ladder with V40 R-Design

Roads are congested. Parking is difficult. The climate is in crisis. No wonder smaller cars are in demand. But imagine, if you will, the kind of car wash that did more than just scrub your car clean, but which – as the combination of washing machines and ignored care labels often do – shrank your car. This then, is precisely what it feels like to drive Volvo’s new V40 T4 R-Design: it is the neatly proportioned hatchback that wants to be a full-on family saloon.

It tries really hard, too. You can just about get a family of four and a dog into the V40 without feeling too crammed, which from the outside you would not imagine possible. There just does not seem enough metal to go around. But to enjoy a real sense of spaciousness, perhaps this car is more for the couple thinking about starting a family, or getting a dog, than one that actually has these encumbrances to stylish driving. Then, said couple can nip about with the nimbleness that leaves the average saloon looking roomy but ungainly.

The V40 is certainly a stylish car, too, without being a show stopper. In large part this is because it is now available with the company’s R Design package of factory-fitted options for those customers tempted by the V40 but who are really looking for something more akin to a V40 . Some get carried away and you can quickly whack up the on the road price. You still won’t get an answer as to what the R in R Design stands for, though.

Ready? Rakish? Roaming? Rapid could be one option: the new V40’s four-cylinder, low friction Drive-E power train is not only economical – the petrol dial barely seemed to move off the full mark after a week of hard driving – and offers the low emissions one might expect of the small car this is not. But it has poke, too, once you get going, that sense of speed underscored by the still-forgiving sports suspension.

There is more to suggest, however, that the word we are looking for is ‘refined’. And there are plenty of details that speak to this: diamond-cut alloy wheels, a fancier grille mesh than your average Volvo, matt silver door mirrors, keyless ignition, sports seats and sports pedals – all of which fall into the “nice to have” rather than “changing my idea of driving” category. It also has what the company is calling “stealth” aluminium interior trim, which sounds like some marketing manager’s euphemistic means of saying there it’s so discreet you can’t actually see it; but which probably just means its use is subtle rather than all over the place. It has that racing car air about it, which is certainly not something one can say about many Volvos. It is all in very good taste, which is something one can say about Scandinavians.