Your correspondent here hasn’t spent any time in an R5’s interior but I quite like that of the A290. Materials look pretty good even if not all of them feel it, and it’s quite functional. There is a touchscreen, of course, but it runs Google’s automotive software which is quick to respond and largely simple to navigate, while climate functions, the door locks, driving assistance switches, the lights, and stability control are all on separate, physical buttons. For me it gets the blend right.
There are some toys on the touchscreen, by the way. G-meters and the like as you might expect, but some gamification functions like a 0-62mph measurer, plus tutorials on how to corner better. Gimmicky, granted, but given Alpine talks things like lift-off oversteer in it, it’s nerdy gimmicky, so I don’t mind that.
They claim the steering wheel is F1 inspired, which means it’s not quite round and has some coloured buttons on it, one for drive modes, one for maximum overtaking urge (pushing the throttle through a kick-down point does the same) and a dial to change the amount of regen. The front seats are pleasingly supportive and large, and although that impacts rear legroom and this is a compact car in the first place, at 5’10” I could still sit behind my own driving position with an inch or two of kneeroom, and about the same headroom. Having five-doors is a practicality advantage and the boot opening is large even if, at 326 litres, the boot itself isn’t vast.
One other scarcely believably weird thing: keen to have commonality between Alpines, the gearshift buttons have been moved to the centre console like the A110s, but that’s where the cupholders would be on the R5, so there aren’t any. Front door pockets are small and the rear have no door pockets at all. Apparently cupholders will become available as an accessory later but it strikes me as an amazing oversight.