Dribble trays at the ready, people. This is the first and only bare carbon Koenigsegg Regera and it’s quite a thing. Quite a menacing thing, in fact.

Now, you may be aware that all 80 of the 1,479bhp, 2,000Nm, 402kph bonkers hybrid hypercars from Sweden (all sold, by the way) are made out of carbon. But this is a very special type of carbon. It’s called “Koenigsegg Naked Carbon”, or KNC for short, and is a special, incredibly time consuming and expensive type of carbon that looks fantastic but also saves weight.

It’s produced like all other forms of carbon fibre (lots of heat, epoxy and an autoclave), but where this differs is that each and every panel is then sanded down to the weave by hand to give a unique silky look and feel. It’s a precise process requiring a steady hand, as if the worker sands too hard – past the weave – the whole thing has to be thrown in the bin. Not one for the morning after the Christmas party then.  

Just like those trendy Jade Rollers you see on Instagram, this unique carbon should be cold to touch as there’s no lacquer to insulate it. The, erm, lack of lacquer also saves weight; 20kg in comparison to a normal carbon bodied car with a paint job. Which – we can only assume – would make the Regera and its 5.0-litre twin-turbo V8, allied to an F1-spec battery pack, even quicker than its claimed 0-400kph in under 20 seconds acceleration time. And who can forget the rolling 150kph to 250kph in 3.2s.

Koenigsegg says that there are also additional benefits as, apparently, this finish is less likely to scratch and chip since the carbon is stronger than the normal epoxy. It also shouldn’t matter if you live in the Sahara or Antartica, as Koenigsegg has temperature tested them (by leaving panels outside for a few years before deciding to do a whole car exterior in the finish) to make sure they don’t become brittle in extreme conditions.

“The Koenigsegg philosophy has always been about exploring extremes,” Koenigsegg boss Christian von Koenigsegg said. “It’s great to extend that idea to a whole new way of finishing and presenting a car.”

We think it looks cracking. And the car’s new Swiss owner must be very happy with his new toy. But this is the internet, so obviously, some of you may disagree.