Lexus’ new 2021 LC500 Convertible puts on the pretty

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  The Lexus LC500 Convertible proves that Lexus can build a beautiful car if it wants. [credit: Jim Resnick ]

In 2018 when the Lexus LC500 coupe first wafted past our eyes, we called it a herald for Lexus' future, a marker for upcoming Lexus design and the first pretty Lexus since the original SC300 & SC400 (known as the Toyota Soarer in Japan).

While the intervening two years have not produced an onslaught of pretty and muscular Lexuses inspired by the LC, the company is now unleashing a convertible LC500 that builds on the pretty to make it prettier, airier, opener, funner, and even slicker. In a world of expensive luxe-niche GTs, the LC Convertible might even out-do the vaunted Mercedes-Benz SL. Though, where the SL offers just two seats and the LC offers four, the two in the rear barely accommodate luggage, let alone very small humans.

However, the Mercedes SL was born an open-top car, and the LC wasn't. And the biggest challenge to engineers when cleaving the roof off a coupe is structural stiffness. Remedies are needed to keep the car from shaking like a paint mixer over bumpy roads (or folding up like a pretzel in the worst of cases). Despite only being Lexus' third convertible in history, the car suffers from none of the shakes of most converted coupes.

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