QOTD: Best Upscale SUV Design of the 2010s?
We continue our discussion of SUV and CUV design from the 2010s today with our third question entry of the series. The first and second editions covered the best and worst parts of affordable SUV/CUV design, with a strict price ceiling of $48,000.
Today we head upscale and only consider really expensive rides.
As before, we have some limiters to keep the competitor field level-ish: Only production vehicles are up for discussion today; no concepts or one-off bespoke trucks. Selections must hail from model years 2010 to 2019. Finally, your best design nominations must cost over $48,000 when new; no cheap stuff today.
Now we move on to my selection, which won’t be what you were expecting:
A CUV that’s barely costly enough to qualify for today’s question, it’s the Porsche Macan. Recalling when Porsche announced they were going to make a smaller CUV to accompany the Cayenne in showrooms, I wasn’t too interested. The first Cayenne looked utterly awful, and appeared dated in roughly two years. The second generation carried more modern styling, but resided in the Expensive Things Realtors Drive category — so I ignored it.
But then the Macan arrived as a 2015 model in the U.S.; I saw an ad somewhere and wasn’t impressed. However, when I saw a couple of these vehicles in person, I began to revise my opinion. I liked the proportions, and how it looked very different to its Audi Q5 sibling. The Porsche face, which looked too big on the Cayenne, was downsized to a reasonable scale for Macan, and it worked. It also seemed as though Porsche sweated the details with regard to quality. Nary a trim piece was misaligned on any example I saw. And not that it matters for today’s discussion, but reviews seemed to state overwhelmingly that the Macan was good to drive. I was sold on the Macan, and remain so today.
But my vote for best design is probably a minority one here. What’s your pick?
[Images: Audi, Porsche]
Interested in lots of cars and their various historical contexts. Started writing articles for TTAC in late 2016, when my first posts were QOTDs. From there I started a few new series like Rare Rides, Buy/Drive/Burn, Abandoned History, and most recently Rare Rides Icons. Operating from a home base in Cincinnati, Ohio, a relative auto journalist dead zone. Many of my articles are prompted by something I'll see on social media that sparks my interest and causes me to research. Finding articles and information from the early days of the internet and beyond that covers the little details lost to time: trim packages, color and wheel choices, interior fabrics. Beyond those, I'm fascinated by automotive industry experiments, both failures and successes. Lately I've taken an interest in AI, and generating "what if" type images for car models long dead. Reincarnating a modern Toyota Paseo, Lincoln Mark IX, or Isuzu Trooper through a text prompt is fun. Fun to post them on Twitter too, and watch people overreact. To that end, the social media I use most is Twitter, @CoreyLewis86. I also contribute pieces for Forbes Wheels and Forbes Home.
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Jeep Grand Cherokee and JL Wrangler
I have driven all sorts of SUV’s and owned a Blazer only as my tow vehicle and hardly used it as my daily driver. I was never convinced of any of them as a car always beat them in comfort and in the handling characteristics of driving a vehicle—until I drove my niece’s Macan S. I was blown away as it felt like driving my Lotus Supercharged Elise power-wise, as well as how it handled. I didn’t really care on how the Macan looked (SUV/CUV-like) but the body grew on me and my wife. Will be in the market for a Macan S soon.