[MUSIC]
There are two primary ways to show your wealth, you could buy the flashiest the most annoying over expression of prosperity and run around town.
Or you could buy a subtle piece of high-quality material and impress those who know what they're looking for.
That, my friends, is the Lexus LC 500h.
It's not gonna break everybody's necks, but people who appreciate, [UNKNOWN] High fashion and more importantly high quality will flock to it.
The DLC is in my opinion the prettiest thing the automaker has built since the FFA and prior to that the original Ellis sedan whereas Lexi's other coupe the RC looks a little messy and takes a god air route to its destination.
The LC is all about long drawn out art.
Is long, low, and very nicely sculpted.
The headlights themselves cleverly designed merge effortlessly into the bodywork terminating it to sharp little running lights there, and for might be the first time in recorded history, the grill is almost appropriately sized for the Lexus.
Now those interesting body liens continue to make their way rearward terminating at the back end where there's even more interesting bodywork going on.
And then there's the tail lights, the shape and design of which contribute to what might be my favorite part of the car.
On the whole, the Lexus LC looks really good, without feeling the need to shout it out just how pretty it is.
The interior keeps the theme of organic art alive there is a lot of flowing lines here especially on the door panel which makes it leather suede to grade effect and let's this metal door handle kinda stand out on their own but they don't really stand out on their own because there is this brushed metal look like it continues across other parts of the dashboard and the door panels.
And then there is the curves.
The curves are everywhere even here on the grab handle on the passenger side of the side of the center console.
It's just beautiful.
Everything I look at looks expensive and everything I touch feels expensive, but of course fashion does come with a price.
There is only one tiny little cup holder upfront and you can kind of get some more storage space from this little coming here in front of the arm rest because well, The arm rest doesn't exactly have a lot of storage on its own either.
Now the door panels, there's only about a room for a single cvs receipt.
And there's the trunk, you don't get a lot of space in the trunk either but that's fine cuz you can use the rear seats as a personal shelf.
I mean it's not like people fit back there.
[MUSIC]
Just as artists best appreciated at one's own pace, Alexa sells a 500 ages best and joins slow and steady.
Part of that comes from the power train which makes this a three and a half liter me six to Alexis hybrid system it's a producing that 354 horsepower Now it is plenty quick but.it is a little less powerful than the VA and the power delivery in this car is kind of strange.
The rear wheels get their motive force through a Frankie sneaky transmission that's kind of basically the love child of a CVT and a four speed automatic.
It shuffles through what it pretends are 10 distinct gears but it's almost always caught flat-footed when I need to accelerate.
Which leads to awkward power delivery and in jumpy behavior at low speeds.
That's why I think this car is best driven slow.
Let the engine stay off and cruise around in silent luxury, without letting all that engineering get in the way.
I mean save the fun for the V8 Marion.
[MUSIC]
Now all that complexity but some damn good fuel economy now, the EPA estimates this carbon to 27 mpg city and 35 highway.
Those are numbers that some economy cars wish they can get on the regular.
Although, to be fair, I wish I can get those numbers on the regular too because I'm over about three to five Mpg in both city and highway scenarios.
Whether fast or slow, I do have to commend the LCE suspension system.
Now it's a doubt that dampers might not provide the pillow soft drive that air suspension would, but.
It does a pretty good job soaking up most of Michigan's back roads without translating that back to the cabin.
And now there is some mild jostling sure but to me, it feels more like the European definition of composure which allows some movement in the cabin just for communication sake.
Lets start off with the things I like about the L series tech, for starters there's a whole bunch of standard safety systems.
Things like auto brake, adaptive cruise control, lane assist are all standard.
And for an extra $1000 line tester, blind spot monitoring, and parking sensor It is pretty great but at the same time it's just a hundred thousand dollars car.
You think that kinda stuff will be standard at this point.
Here's another tech that I really dig.
For $1,120 Mark Levenson reference surround sound packs 13 speakers, 915 watts and this is one of my favorite in car audio system across the industry.
Amazon Alexa and Apple car play integration come along for the ride too, which is great!
And then there's the infotainment system.
This hot mess of a thing has been through several renovations over the years.
All of them bad, all of them sporting the exact same graphics that persist to this very day.
Well I do appreciate the 10.3 inch screen and the fact that it been displaying multiple thing at once, I absolutely lower this touch pad interface, it is difficult to use while driving and it's very easy to swipe right past the finger looking for it requiring a whole bunch of unneccessary [UNKNOWN], And motions.
Not worth it.
I also hate the fact that the seat heaters can only be accessed through a series of menus and clumsy maneuvers with the touch pad.
I mean, I do appreciate the fact that they stay on when you get out of the car and then you get back in to the car, but any adjustment to the seat heating or cooling system itself requires just the dumbest dance on the planet.
[SOUND]
The Lexus LC occupies a strange spot riding a very fine line between grand tour and sports coupe.
And in its hybrid form, I think it decidedly leans towards the former hanging out in the segment with some pretty good cars that tow a similar line, like the Mercedes Benz S Class coupe.
BMW eight series or Porsche 911.
Yet thanks to the LC's lack of storage space it's not exactly cut out for long trips on the countryside either.
With a base price of $96,710 and an as tested price of about 101 grand the Lexus LC500H isn't exactly cheap.
But then again it feels like it's worth every penny of that money.
Lexus put a lot of attention into the looks, the materials, and even the complicated hybrid system, and you can tell it's not exactly without its faults, but in terms of an under the radar flagship coupe that doesn't make you look like a bad snob, well, the LC is not a bad way to go.
[MUSIC]
