Top 10 best car accessories, ever!

We used to be grateful for a cup holder, in awe of a large glove box or pay extra for heated seats. Oh, how times have changed! These days, we’re talking coffee machines, Champagne flutes, deck chairs and yes, a baguette holder.
Answering the question you didn’t know you needed to ask, we bring you the very best car accessories ever invented. Cheers! And bon appetit!

Mais oui. A wicker baguette holder by the passenger seat in the new Renault 5 is just what’s required for a touch of la joie de vivre. Its material is a nod to sustainability, it speaks volumes about the lifestyle-derived design of the model, and shows that Renault has a neat sense of humour. We’re in, although obviously a croissant cradle would have been better.

You may argue that Rolls-Royce was first to the party with umbrellas integrated into the doors, but that just makes a similar move by Skoda, king of the bargain basement, even more genius. Here’s a brand saying that it can do the luxury touches too, but for less than a tenth of the price. Puts a smile on your face. And then there’s the Skoda ice scraper, tucked into the inside of the fuel filler cap. Hugely practical solution if you’re like us and constantly lose the bloody thing.
Find your perfect Skoda on Auto Trader

Ah, now here’s the pinnacle of car accessories: a faithful replica of the sky at night, crafted in minute and sparkling detail on the massive ceiling of your massive car. Rolls-Royce can create a starlit sky, by piercing the roof liner with thousands of tiny LEDs, to mirror the constellation on any date you choose, like your birthday. And for the extra wow factor, you can specify shooting stars, which trace intermittently across the ceiling. The whole canopy of delight stays on, dims or turns off at the touch of a button.
Check out the Rolls-Royce Cullinan on Auto Trader

Fiat coffee maker

When Fiat replaced the 500L MPV with the 500X, styled to look like an oh-so-trendy SUV, the L’s most trendy feature didn’t make the transition, sadly: an integrated Lavazza espresso machine. A world first… and world last, to date, it’s the most Itailan option ever. A small pod machine that sat snugly in the rear cupholder dock, it brewed hot, fresh espresso at the touch of a button.
Read our review of the Fiat 500X here

For the UHNWI who has everything. Unsurprisingly, this set, which features a “Refreshment Case” and a “Master Flight station” is popular in the UAE, where hunting with birds beats hunting with hounds. You get a GPS bird tracking unit, binoculars, removable perch and hand-crafted leather bird hoods and gauntlets. Oh, and a removable perch on the central armrest so your falcon gets a decent view of the road ahead.
Read our Bentley Bentayga review here

How Cali-life is a taco tray? Way better than a “sandwich station”, which would be its name in the UK. Fisker’s Ocean SUV is a lovely electric car, with other brilliant features including a window in the back especially for your dog to stick his head out of, and optional solar panels on the roof. We hope Fisker can pull itself back from the financial brink because it deserves to succeed with such imaginative car design.
Check out our full Fisker Ocean review here

Lots of electric cars repurpose the bonnet space liberated by not having a massive petrol engine there into a “frunk” – a front trunk. It’s a great place to separately store dirty charging cables. Lucid had other ideas for the Gravity SUV, though, transforming the space into a ‘love seat’ for two – the perfect opportunity for lifestyle-y PR pictures of the car’s beautiful occupants parked up by the sea and sat gazing at a Californian sunset. In reality, you’ll probably still chuck your dirty cables in there. Clever idea, though.
Find out more about Lucid Motors here

Citroen’s 2CV became a classic from virtually the moment it was launched in 1948, enjoying an amazing 42-year production run; most cars last seven years these days. It was simple, cheap to run and repair, comfy and surprisingly practical. One of its most ingenious features was its ‘picnic chairs’, which were tube framed, light and easy to remove, making the 2CV the perfect car for a picnic or trip to the beach. Plus, remove the rear seats… 2CV becomes a van. Ish.

Picture the scene – you and your mates have driven off into the wilds in your Hummer EV Pick-Up, you’ve pitched camp, the fire is crackling away, you’ve got burgers on the barbecue and the beer is flowing but nobody’s brought a guitar to knock out some tunes and tinny phone speakers aren’t going to cut it for soundtracking this lifestyle dream. No problem. Drop the MultiPro tailgate, pair your phone to the integrated 100W Kicker soundbar, open up your ‘campsite party’ playlist and cut loose! Obviously, this scenario works better in some epic American landscape surrounded by towering pine trees and mountains rather than angry, finger-wagging caravaners on a rainy Welsh campsite. As, indeed, does the Hummer EV itself. But it’s good to dream.

Without wishing to pander too hard to stereotypes let’s just say Porsche understands its demographic, and that the crossover between sports car fans and MAMILs (which is to say cycling obsessed ‘Middle-Aged Men in Lycra’) is actually very well established. While you can actually stick a roof rack on a 911 and carry your fancy carbon road bike that way a slicker solution exists for the Taycan Cross Turismo , with a super neat ‘plug-in’ carrier that slots into special slots on the bumper for a secure set-up and no need for an ugly tow bar when you’re not using it. The design also means it’s capable of carrying heavy e-bikes with no fuss. Peak lifestyle. And while not cheap arguably the perfect combination of expensive toys for men of a certain age. Ski bags, luggage sets, roof boxes and even a dog carrier are other options available on the Taycan’s exhaustive accessories list.
More on options for carrying your bike on your car here!