I spent some time at the Lincoln exhibit at the LA Auto Show and came away with mixed emotions.
Honestly, I think their new cars are good looking from the outside. The new MKZ, Continental concept, MKX and MKC are pretty sharp and I do really like the new face of Lincoln. I think it'll look great on CUVs once it makes its way there.
However, Lincoln has a very long way to go with interiors. Very long. It's a mix of colors and textures that don't quite mesh, and the designs are quite frankly ugly. The upward swooping dashes look like late '90s concept cars. They're not elegant at all, and in the MKX and MKC, it looks like a center console is missing. Lincoln's brown interior color on the MKC has a lot of purple in it, and under the white lights at the auto show, the interior looked purple, brown and tan. Gross.
Steering wheels are very "blah" looking and don't appear premium at all to the eyes or hands. Some nice soft touch surfaces exist, but there are expanses of the dash that just seem very plain and understyled. The electronic buttons on the dash for the shifter have got to go. This transmission concept has potential, but Lincoln needs to look to Jaguar for inspiration. Having 18" of vertical buttons down the dash in place of a transmission shifter is stupid and looks tacky.
Seats were very comfortable and the interior of the MKX was extremely quiet. I think that the MKX is a big step up for Lincoln, but it poses no real threat to the RX or class leaders.
If they refreshed the interior of the MKX, put the new Lincoln face on the front end and dropped that 400hp V6 into it, they'd have an absolute winner.
As for the LaCrosse, the interior press pics are heavily photoshopped, as one would expect. In person, it's very much the same corporate GM stuff - flat, boring door panels, small buttons, cheap looking steering wheel, etc. The overall design is a nice evolution and decent for the class, but we are not talking about an ES 350-slayer by any means. I also find the exterior of the car - aside from the front end - to be quite unattractive.