The video for the Spice Girls' debut single, Wannabe, begins outside the St Pancras Hotel in London. As the band approaches the entrance, so too does an uptight, aristocratic family of four, dressed in finery and visibly uncomfortable in the presence of an emphatic Scary Spice. And what sort of car would such a family arrive in? A Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow, of course.

Back in 1996, Rolls-Royce was a byword for the establishment. Staid and stuffy, the Rolls-Royce of the Nineties did not have a large role to play in Cool Britannia. Pop and rock stars occasionally bought themselves Rollers, but John Lennon giving his Phantom V a psychedelic paint job and Keith Moon (maybe) driving one into a swimming pool weren't enough to make it a young person's car.

The Telegraph London