The tailors of Tsim Sha Tsui might let out a cheer for the Evora, for at last here is a Lotus you can get into without worrying about splitting your trousers. Lotuses have been more sartorially friendly: James Bond hunk Roger Moore seemed to glide into the Esprit S1 without letting rip in The Spy Who Loved Me, but that was in pre-Supersize Me 1977 and the Malaysian-backed British marque has since designed mainly low slung, compact and spartan cars for right-foot fun rather than seat-of-the-pants style.
So male devotees of the Exige have had reason to ask their tailors for an extra inch of inside leg to accommodate their stride over the car's broad sidebeams and into its narrow footwell. Female Lotus fans learned to avoid Britney Spears-type compromises to their hemlines in the Elise by approaching the seats rear-first, kicking off their heels to avoid scuff on the metal floor, and then curling into driving position on the inside buttock. Some young things still find such manoeuvres fun or eccentrically British, but others have noted that the cars' cramped cabins can also crumple a suit on a commute.
The Europa S attempted more comfort with padded upholstery, and the Porsche Cayman seemed more skirt friendly. But this Evora is the most accessible Lotus yet. The marque's first all-new model since the 1995 Elise, the Evora has a lower sill that is 20cm narrower than the 100cm version in the Elise. Its front seats have been raised by 65mm 'for the serious daily driver'. The test car's doors also seem to open wider than those of the Exige and Elise.
About time, too. Lotus wants to broaden its appeal from ageing devotees who can no longer squeeze into their Elises, and reach a new generation of snappy dressers who see no need to clamber into the crease of a sports car. The HK$1.038 million Evora makes suits look good. Created by Lotus Design, the hand-made test car sits on Yokohama 225/40 ZR18 tyres at the front and 255/35 ZR19s at the rear and seems as squat and athletic as the Elise. Short overhangs are offset by rear-quarter pillar and high-rear blindness in parking, but the car's undulating shoulder line, vents, twin pipes and oval mouth draw glances along Gloucester Road. The interior seems larger than the Elise's but not the Cayman's and is well-finished with 'precision-engineered' metal inserts. The hand-stitching of the leather surfaces is as fine as Porsche's and BMW's but not Mercedes-Benz's and the flat-bottomed steering wheel creates extra thigh space. The 160-litre boot is said to hold a set of golf clubs and has a fresh-air cooling system to counter the heat from the engine bay, but you should resist the temptation to leave a Camembert there in our July heat. You also get lots of audio tech, from a fine Alpine stereo along with Bluetooth, hands-free telephone, iPod docking and a seven-inch touch screen linked to reversing cameras whose beepers get manic when you are about a metre from a shunt.
The cabin is sufficiently sound insulated for easy conversation, but the longer I drive the Evora the more I sense that its ergonomics aren't quite right. The door handles are hard to find at first and the seatbelts are difficult to instal without lifting the centre armrest. Worse, the bucket seats seem as tight around the hips as they are roomy and supportive on the back, and the three pedals feel to the left of where they ought to be, as if to allow for the bulge of the off-side wheel arch. Rapid heel and toe is also harder than in the Porsche Cayman S or the Boxster - the pedals seem squeezed together. I was tempted to get really naughty with this car in Kowloon Tong but my size 46 feet felt too big to fully control it in busy traffic. So bigfoots might test it in driving shoes or rimless loafers, which counters the marque's claim of making leg and headroom for a pair of two metre American passengers.
The dashboard also needs a redesign. The dials are illegible at speed without reading glasses and while their red glow evokes devilish performance, their glint distracts in day driving and might irritate at night. The Range Rover Sport's clock graphics and Hyundai's ice-blue dial lighting would have been more driver friendly. Worse, the steering wheel obscures dial information and the buttons to its right, causing me to feel for the Sport button and then glance down for it at speed. Lotus is proud of its hard-top and body's strength, but the lack of sunroof in the design defeats the old wind-in-the-hair joy of the Elise on commutes, possibly to steer you towards the marque's promise of a subsequent convertible version. Lotus' '2+2' claim also falls apart because there is only enough room for a couple of 10-year-olds in the back and mums might find toddlers are hard to see, or reach, behind large front seats. So, you might consider the Evora '2+0' (HK$988,000), or instead try the Cayman, designed by Hong Kong's own Pinky Lai.