ROVER'S Cowley-built Rover 75 has been voted the world's most beautiful executive saloon. The accolade brings the number of prestigious awards scooped by the luxury car to four in the space of a week.

Its award-winning streak began when German Sunday newspaper, Bild am Sonntag awarded the car its Golden Steering Wheel Award - the first British-built car to do so.

Just days later the Rover 75 was voted The Journal/AA Car of the Year and earlier this week a panel of leading Italian and international automotive experts voted the car one of the world's most beautiful cars.

BBC TV Top Gear presenter Quentin Willson, who was one of three judges in The Journal/AA Car of the Year award, said: "Rover is to be congratulated for achieving one of the most dramatic transformations in the style, quality, safety and sheer driving pleasure of any product that we have seen for a very long time."

The Society of Plastic Engineers has also announced that the Rover 75's V6 plastic intake system has won an award for innovative use of plastic.

The Rover 75 has already won several major awards after being launched in June, including What Car? Car of the Year 1999/Compact Executive Car of the Year; Diesel Car of the Year and Auto Express World Car 1999.

It was also the only executive car to be short-listed in the European Car of the Year 2000 awards. The Rover 75 will be put on display with other category winners in the world's most beautiful car awards, such as the Ferrari 360 Modena, Audi TT and Mercedes-Benz CL, at a major international exhibition, Design in Motion 2000, being staged next March in Milan.

Story date: Wednesday 24 November

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.