Back then only Lexus did real good interiors. The Lincoln LS did not hold a candle to the real LS.

 

I don't buy that glamourized press photo one bit. I drove one of those as a rental car, granted my memories are 25+ years old at this point, but the Seville interior shared the same shiny plastic materials that the other Cadillacs had at the time, so it felt and creaked similarly. If you compare the steering wheels, they're almost identical minus the woodgrain portions and color.

 

Even Lexus interiors couldn't hold a candle to Jaguar's (former) interiors.....arguably the industry's former standard apart from the mega-luxury class such as Bentley, RR, and Maybach.


It did hold a candle, but one that admittedly wasn't quite as bright. And the first LS400 interiors were nowhere near the equal of the later LS models that followed them.

 

Not only are they ugly but what that photo doesn't show is the peeling. I knew someone that had a DeVille with 30k miles on it and the buttons all over the radio looked awful.

They'd end up looking like this

 

^^^^ At least on that Cadillac, one can basically tell one button from another by the shapes. Try dealing with 80s/90s-vintage Oldsmobile dashes that looked like this LOL:

 

Don't get me started on that era Jag interiors. Total joke if we are discussing quality and fit, a low mile XJR I worked on was almost as rattly as a C5 vette

 

My Dad had a 95 Seville STS, and ALMOST bought a 98 STS which was the same generation as that picture, instead he got the 98 LS400. So, we spent a lot of time in the interior of that car. That generation Seville interior was not bad, it had nice quality materials, nice real wood, nice leather. Certainly no equal to a European car or a Lexus, but not bad. His 95 STS had nice materials too, the design was just really old and fit and finish weren't very good.

But the Deville interior you posted was nowhere near as nice as the Seville. The Deville was never made to compete with foreign rivals the Seville was.

 

I'll admit Jag quality-control was hit-or-miss, but my opinion still stands on the opulence of their former classic wood-and-leather interiors, although I respect your view if you don't want to discuss it any further.

 

You are just wowed by the wood. The rest of their interiors were not great at all, even the XJ.

 

Many (false) Senior-Citizen stereotypes are given to some large sedans and some vehicle-makes....but the DeVille/DTS was one that, in fact, deserve the stereotype. It was rare to see someone under about 60 or 65 driving one. The Seville, particularly the STS Touring version, like the Lincoln LS, appealed to those a little less-geriatric, and who wanted slightly better handling....although there was also a more softly-sprung SLS Luxury version as well.

 

Cosmetically Jaguar interiors were always nice, but the quality was lacking, and particularly in the 90ies when they were owned by Ford, their interiors were terrible.

 

I mean it looks nice until you get up close to it, then you can see the leather pulling, wood cracking, and general misalignment of parts and if you actually go to sit down the amount of noise and panel movement is distracting/annoying.

Yeah "the plank" is impressive at first but not even its falling apart at 60k miles. Contrast this with a 230k+ mile 430 where all the wood is still perfect. Big differences in quality

 

Early LS/SC/GS also used thick planks of wood that would crack - it's just natural for wood to crack from extreme temperature and humidity changes inside of a car. Then Lexus switched to thinly veneered wood on top of metal substrate, that holds up forever. Many clueless idiots in the automotive press accused Lexus of using fake wood, which was just not the case, at least in the higher end models.

The Lincoln LS was a weird frankenstein, but I guess it sold in decent quantities, they were relatively popular around here. I remember they lost value like used diapers, lol.

 

Where? It's very rare to see the wood cracked outside of the wheels on the LS430 on any of the cars you mentioned. No Lexus has ever used fake wood to my knowledge, if it looks like wood it is wood.

The 430 is an early LS and the same years as the cars in question, the 400 would need to be compared to the ancient semi-hand built cars that absolutely fall apart.

 

The Viper is just so raw that it honestly wouldn’t bother me. As long as the interior doesn’t fall to pieces like my SC300’s door panels, I could live with it.

I daily drove my mom’s 1999 Saturn SL2 for six years so I can live with most cars. The C5 Corvette thing did really bother me a lot because the Chevy Cavalier was the worst car I’d ever been in and it looked just like it.