Jalopnik
One of the Jalops just happened to be visiting Ai Design at its home in Tuckahoe, NY on a day this matte-finish Mercedes CLS 55 AMG sat on a garage lift casting its evil gaze upon the workshop. Naturally, the most striking feature of the car — customized for DC Shoes co-founder Ken Block — is a flawlessly applied flat black paint job (whose price tag was pegged unofficially at around $30,000). Using a Brabus K8 performance kit and sport exhausts, the team boosted horsepower to 575 from 469 stock. They also tricked it out with a Brabus suspension module, Michelin Pilot Sport 2 tires over Radenergie R10 20" wheels and Brembo eight-piston racing brake calipers and 15" discs in front, and four-pot calipers and 13.6" discs in the rear. It's really super hot in person, though we'd imagine fingerprints could become troublesome. Hey, there's always cashmere gloves. [Gallery]
[Hat tip to German Car Scene]
Related:
SEMA Show: Matte Is This Year's Black [internal]
Comments
I don't care what you do to a CLS, i just can't get on board with it...
Good to see that DC shoes decided to contract with AI to design the thing, because if DC actually designed the car themselves it would probably just fall apart within a week from moderate use... just like their footwear.
that's niiiiiice. Looks like something Vader would drive and anything in that category, I approve of.
Ai CLS: eats puppies, kittens, happiness. kills rainbows and unicorns for fun.
Toss some tire shine on there though, the tires look grey.
looks good.
That's the only custom Merc I've seen in a while that doesn't make me vomit.
Every car I've ever owned has been matte black. Does this mean I'm finally part of the "in" crowd?
Making the car even hotter was the fact that it was sitting next to that Donk. NOTHING could look bad in comparison.
30k? I'll run by home depot and pick up some primer and get the job done for $20.
Then again, that's why I don't run an automotive design shop.
That thing is sexy. Matte black is the new black.
Ai Design does FANTASTIC work in general. I've been to their shop (a friend of mine had them do some work to his Continental), and some of the things they do are just outrageous, but not in a gaudy, 14-year-old-boy sort of way. Always really tasteful and high quality. This CLS is a great example.
If I was ever to have a car customized, they would get the business, hands down.
And wohho... the tires are supposed to look gray like that. It's part of the design; they were specially treated to give them a grayed-out look. Sort of the anti-armorall.
well in that case, the tires are stupid, the rest of the car is teh hotness.
ummm... flat black paint. How would that show fingerprints?
And that seems really shiny for flat black.
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