Aston Martin, the luxury car maker, has announced its intention to join forces with Toyota to build an exclusive, small city car.

The new car will sell for about £20,000 and is a far cry from the style and performance to which Aston drivers have become since the company was founded in 1914.

Toyota said it would build an ultra-small car based on its iQ model for Aston Martin in what would be the Japanese carmaker’s only original equipment manufacturing deal with an outside brand.

The Aston Martin vehicle, to be called Cygnet, will have its own styling to differentiate it from the iQ, which Toyota says is the world’s smallest four-seater car at less than 3 metres long. It will be sold in Europe.

A Toyota spokesman said other details such as the launch date, price and production volumes had not been decided.

“Much work is still required, but I am confident that this project could become reality in the not-too-distant future,” Ulrich Bez, Aston Martin chief executive said.

He added: “Aston Martin has reduced the CO₂ emissions of its cars by 15 per cent in the past year but it has no real impact on anything. What the Cygnet will do is allow our customers to drive a very special car with all the hallmarks of Aston Martin’s design philosophy but one that is cheap to run, is environmentally friendly."

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