I’m standing on the seafront in the South of France, but it’s probably not quite what Audi had in mind when it planned the launch of the TT Roadster. There’s no hubbub, no heaving throngs in thongs. But then there isn’t any sun either. A duvet of cloud is smothering the Col de Vence above us and an electric storm is rolling rapidly in across the bay.

This isn’t the weather for taking photographs either, and through the wind and a Gore-Tex hood I can hear an exasperated noise coming from Andy Morgan as part of a tripod wings its way into the churning Med. A couple of clearly insane surfers look on and probably say something like ‘Dude’.

At least the roadster is a good-looking car to photograph. The new shape is more sophisticated and, because the roof now extends further back along the body, sleeker too. With the heavens open, the fabric roof is getting a good workout. At the fingering of a switch on the transmission tunnel, it takes just 12 seconds to furl or unfurl. When up, it cocoons us comfortingly from the wintery elemental barrage. When it’s down we get wet, although we do remain buffet-free thanks to the standard-fit electrically operated wind deflector.

The interior is a paragon of Audi quality – everything you touch clicking, twisting or swivelling with a precision-damped accuracy. Like the exterior it doesn’t have the impact of the original TT, but there are still some nice individualities like the flat-bottomed wheel and the three circular vents mirrored by the three circular control dials below. The centre console also now tilts towards the driver, BMW-style, suggesting that this might be more than just a posing tool for coiffeurs.

As you’d expect, the structure has been strengthened, primarily in the sills where they’ve added extruded aluminium sections, but also in the windscreen surround with a high-strength steel tube. Impressively, however, the roadster weighs just 35kg more than the coupe.

As Andy and I head off towards the bright lights of Monaco in search of a drier photo location, all is instantly reassuring. The steering has a pleasing weight and linearity, while the stubby gearshift is slick yet with a whiff of the mechanical between ratios.

As it’s our pick of the coupes, I’ve snaffled the keys to a 2-litre model, which means the 197bhp TFSI engine from the Golf GTI driving only the front wheels. Although it’s the base model (so the electric roof is optional) it is astonishingly rapid, pulling harder than the figures suggest. And what’s more, it’s characterful. I remember once thinking the Golf sounded good from the outside on a full-bore upshift, but the TT Roadster has layers of wonderful burbling sound coming from its exhaust. There’s a hard-edged induction note as you accelerate, but the best bit is if you back off the throttle from anywhere above three or four thousand rpm, when you’re treated to a fantastic diminishing gargle washing into the cockpit.

Find some corners and it feels much like its coupe sibling: sharp and surprisingly inertia free on turn-in, the steering and front end enabling ruthless accuracy if not providing the last word in detailed feedback. The body remains very controlled through both tighter and longer turns. The only negative is the shuddering you can occasionally feel from low down in the chassis. It doesn’t really influence the capabilities of the car massively, and there isn’t the hideous scuttle-shake of the RS4 Cabriolet, but drive over an imperfect surface and, almost because the car is so stiff, you can feel the affected sections stutter.

Audi has undoubtedly got another success on its hands, though. It’s roomier than both SLK and Z4 and, if you’re not fussy about rear-wheel drive, a dynamic match too. But perhaps most importantly, the TT attracted a lot of attention, at least from those brave enough to venture out into what the Germans delighted in telling us was ‘very British weather, ha-ha!’.