If a lie is convincing or benign enough, people tend to believe it. Hawaiian pizza has nothing to do with Hawaii, Yogen Früz is actually Canadian and Arizona Iced Tea isn’t made in Arizona. Just like everyone’s favorite gas station iced tea brand, the Lincoln by Vignale isn’t exactly honest about its origins.
First, let’s go back in time to early 1987, a time where yuppie culture is in full swing. Educated dual-income professionals are making a ton of money and they want everyone to know it. They’re skiing in Aspen, they’re trading in Manhattan, their consumption is conspicuous and European luxury car aspirations ridiculous. At the height of this craze, Lincoln was ready to cash in and had one luxury convertible in their crosshairs – the Cadillac Allante. Come again?
Yes, the Allante. Designed and coachbuilt by Pininfarina, the flagship Cadillac was an ambitious and expensive Italian-American hybrid. Bodies were shipped by air from Turin International Airport to Detroit in specially-modified Boeing 747s, then finished in Hamtramck. Everything about the Allante seemed radical, forward-thinking, sumptuous and European-derived. Needless to say, Lincoln was not about to get out-opulenced by Cadillac. Cue the Lincoln by Vignale.
The Big Lie
While the Lincoln by Vignale (also known as the Vignale Gilda) was a technological tour-de-force, it did have one small problem. Vignale hadn’t existed for almost two decades. See, Italian car company DeTomaso scooped up both Ghia and Vignale in 1967 and 1969 respectively. It turns out that DeTomaso wasn’t so great at keeping these two styling houses afloat, so the two were packaged up and sold off to Ford in the early 1970s. Suddenly, Vignale was superfluous and only Ghia remained in operation as part of Ford’s European design operations.
Okay, so Vignale doesn’t exist, but maybe the Lincoln by Vignale was styled by Ghia? Guess again. Styling of the Lincoln by Vignale came straight out of Ford’s North American Design Center in Dearborn, Michigan. Yes, this design is as American as the KFC Double Down. So where does Italy come in? Ghia built the body, and that’s about it.
But wait, that raises another question. If the Lincoln by Vignale was built by Ghia, why wasn’t it called the Lincoln by Ghia? Well, I can think of two possible reasons. The first is the Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. This attractive little Beetle-based coupe is still what most Americans think of when they hear “Ghia.” The second is what Ford did with the Ghia name after acquisition. See, Ghia became a trim level, and that trim level was foisted upon Americans in the form of a posh Granada. The Granada was a poorly-built turd that Ford’s marketing team claimed looked just like a Mercedes-Benz. Not exactly the sort of vehicle you’d want associated with a flagship luxury cabriolet, is it?
Hey, That’s Pretty Sleek
Sure, the Lincoln by Vignale’s design may have been American, but you’d never be able to tell. From the ultra-thin multi-beam composite headlamps to the minimalist interpretation of the continental spare tire, this thing just oozes European restraint. Let’s start with the profile. Simply classy, clean and devoid of excess brightwork, the Lincoln by Vignale displays a sense of modernity not seen on a 1987 Mercedes-Benz SL. The Lincoln’s extremely low prow is a key differentiation from the Allante’s shoebox silhouette and is made possible by those aforementioned ultra-thin multi-beam headlamps. Four distinct elements in each lamp should provide ample illumination while allowing a wedge-like profile unspoiled by pop-up lamp assemblies.
Around the back of the Lincoln by Vignale, tri-color tail lamps frame a unique, minimalist take on Lincoln’s iconic continental spare tire. Instead of a protrusion in the trunk lid, this continental spare tire throwback is a simple arch on the back of the car. Very sleek, although not quite as show-stopping as the roof situation.
In posh, pinkies-out upper-class convertible tradition, the Lincoln by Vignale has two roofs, a hardtop and a soft top. However, that’s about where tradition ends. The hardtop is practically a fishbowl with three massive windows offering an expansive view of the scenery. The soft top stows under a long double-bubble tonneau cover that makes the R107 Mercedes SL’s simple slab seem as uninspired as heading to Guitar Center and playing Wonderwall on an acoustic demo guitar. Put all these elements together and you have a rather beautiful two-seater.
On Your Marks
Was the Lincoln by Vignale a concept? That depends on what you think a concept car should be. This Lincoln definitely isn’t some far-fetched show car with billionaire doors and laser beams for windshield wipers – a significant chunk of the interior is plucked straight out of the then-upcoming MN12 Ford Thunderbird, while one press photo shows an obviously tacked-on third brake light. Moreover, it’s widely reported that the Lincoln by Vignale shared underpinnings with the Thunderbird, so much of the heavy R&D should have been baked-in. Sure, there are some things conspicuously missing like a fuel door and side reflectors, but no missing exterior elements would have been terribly difficult to add for production.
That being said, the drivetrain is a bit of a different story. See, the Lincoln by Vignale was purported to spin all four wheels, a radical departure from any American luxury car, and the product of a collaboration between Ford and Porsche.
So what went wrong? Well, lots of things if I’m being honest. This article from Automotive News has a nice overview of the MN12 platform’s development, while Comeback: The Fall & Rise of the American Automobile Industry by Paul Ingrassia and Joseph B. White features a more in-depth look. To sum up, the head of the MN12 project, Anthony S. Kuchta, was given an impossible task: build a retail-grade coupe benchmarked against the best coupes from Europe. When the project came in over its cost and weight targets, people in the C-suite were unhappy. Tony’s team had made an amazing car, but Ford’s suits saw dollar signs rather than flagship potential. Engineering the MN12 platform for all-wheel-drive would have further exacerbated the project’s price creep, something Ford absolutely wouldn’t have allowed.
As for timing, the late 1980s wouldn’t have been a brilliant time to launch a high-end convertible. The Lincoln by Vignale debuted in 1987, just months before Black Monday. I know it’s easy to write off stock market averages as charts for the feelings of the rich, but The Dow Jones falling 508 points in a single day is a bad sign for people who want rich customers to pony up for expensive convertibles. Sure enough, a recession was just around the corner in 1990. While Lincoln probably could have sold a few Lincoln by Vignales, the zeitgeist just wasn’t right. Take a look at Cadillac Allante sales figures and you’ll see what I mean. Cadillac managed to produce just 21,395 Allantes over a seven model year production run, with roughly 22.5 percent sold in the Allante’s extended first year of production. Not exactly brilliant for something so astronomically expensive to produce. In contrast, Chevrolet made at least 20,479 Corvettes every year during the Allante’s production run.
So did the Lincoln by Vignale deserve to be a production car? I reckon it did. See, another typical expensive luxury cabriolet wouldn’t have been a brilliant idea, but all-wheel-drive would have been a game-changer. Subaru and Audi were making waves as purveyors of all-weather cars for the ski set, attracting discerning, university-educated, slightly left-field customers. The exact sort of customer base that would have helped Lincoln shake off its elderly white bread image. Across the oceans, all-wheel-drive was about to be deployed in a dramatic manner in the Porsche 911 Carrera 4 and Nissan Skyline GT-R, high-end performance cars that could be used all year round. They sold pretty well, too. After all, the greatest luxury in the world is time. Add in the Lincoln by Vignale’s devilishly good looks and you have a fantastic recipe for a unique, innovative high-end car. In fact, the biggest problem I see is where Lincoln would’ve gone after the Lincoln by Vignale. The Continental was just a Taurus with wood, the Town Car was a bit antiquated and no compact luxury sedan was on offer to entice younger buyers. Hey, if one forward-thinking flagship could’ve lit a fire under Lincoln’s ass, more power to it.
Lead photo credit: Ford Motor Company
you guys need to do an in depth story on the Cadillac Allante’s Pontiac cousin.
The Pontiac Skante
I like the way you’re thinking.
https://www.autoweek.com/car-life/a1918986/debilitating-skabsession/
(RIP, Davey.)
Subaru XT?
2 door first generation legacy, or maybe later the SVX
This was my immediate take as well.
XT had already been out for a couple years by then. I get more SVX vibes from it. Both were ridiculously priced for a Subaru. My ‘88 XT6 stickered at something like $38K. Of course by the time I got it a decade later it was scrap priced.
At various times I had a ‘86 turbo, and a couple of ‘88 XT6’s. A buddy had an ‘85 that we transplanted a low range trans from a legacy wagon. Good times, we drove that and the xt turbo all over the sand dunes at silver lake on 13” tires without ever getting stuck.
I’ve always loved the Vignale concept, I always assumed it was the precursor to the MK VIII(a flagship coupe not the styling) which was on a stretched MN12 platform. But I never knew the Vignale was actually supposed to be on a version of MN12! I’m sad at the loss of what could have been if the recession didn’t hit. I can see it now, a used Vignale on hockey puck spacers with snow tires being hooned by some midwestern teens in a parking lot in front of a RadioShack. It would have been glorious…
Beautiful car, especially with the hardtop in place (too bad it wasn’t a dedicated coupe model) but given the sales of the Allante and Chrysler TC by Maserati I don’t see it selling any better. Or at all, since even if it hadn’t been scotched when it was the second-year sales slump of both those cars would’ve put the nail in the coffin of the FoMoCo version.
I always wanted to like the Allante, and the XLR even more, but there was just something about the design that kept them from being right. Especially a shame with the performance of the XLR-V.
Interestingly, one of the cutest girls at Harper Woods High was Gilda Vignale. I think she ended up marrying Carmen Ghia.
I agreed with you until I watched that little video clip. This car was DOA because it was introduced by the same robot that Rocky Balboa gave to Paulie for his birthday in Rocky IV. If that’s the celebrity endorsement you went after, then something’s very, very wrong. Like some agent couldn’t get Burt Young, so they settled on his robot.
Glad I wasn’t the only one to notice the robot!
holy shit I was able to login and actually get to a blog!
(I know this place is new, but man, fix the “stay logged in” section of the comments).
Protip; It’ll give you a *password* reject message even if it’s the correct one but your *username* is wrong (for example using the email address instead of username).
I’m just happy to be able to comment on even a few articles. More than half the pages show me as logged out. I move off the page and I’m magically logged back in.
Try to click Reload/Refresh in your browser if it shows your are logged out. That does it for me.
I noticed that if you navigate to some articles through the sub-menu links (News, Reviews, etc.) rather than the Home Page, it sometimes keeps you logged in. I think the key is the path you took to get to the articles. Good luck.
Question: How should one pronounce “Hamtramck”?
There’s a silent I before the CK for … Michigan reasons.
Ham-Tram-Ick
Silent was the wrong term there. Implied? Invisible?
“Implied” makes sense to me. Thanks!
It’s a Polish thing – we’re lucky we get any vowels at all. My wife tells people her maiden name is “A followed by the rest of the alphabet in no particular order.”
Ham. Tram. Ick.
That’s what I yell when I get in line at the all you can eat buffet.
“ALL ABOARD THE HAM TRAM!” followed by other people finishing it up with “…ick.”
And now, Vignale is a trim level, just as Ghia was before it. Ghia (the trim level) lasted a lot longer in Europe, but was phased out by 2010.
https://www.ford.co.uk/cars/new-kuga/models-specs/vignale
I see a lot of W platform Cutlass Coupe in the back glass and side profile… wonder if there was a little copying going on.
I see it too which was also similar in styling to the smaller Saturn SL and SC which that just a few years after this.
Reminded me of the Dodge Intrepid if it had released about 5 years earlier than it did.
Yep – came here to say this. Can’t stop thinking Cutlass when I look at these photos.
It’s a good thing that it didn’t get made. It would’ve been remembered as the Lincoln version of the TC by Maserati.
We did get the Mustang Ghia in the mid-70’s though so I don’t quite get the VW reasoning. I would have guessed that it was that Ford got the Ghia packages and Lincoln got the Vignale.
The design language was sufficiently different from other Ford products that that likely wouldn’t have been a problem – Chrysler botched the TC by launching the new LeBaron first, doing it out of order made the TC look like an expensive LeBaron, instead of having the LeBaron come out as a cheaper TC. But I expect it still would have been a costly dead-end like Merkur, or GM’s Allante/Reatta/Trofeo trifecta.
I wonder if Ford’s acquisition of Jaguar Cars Plc. in 1989 played a role, also. They no longer had as much of an incentive to try to reinvent Lincoln to chase European luxury car buyers once they had an actual Euro luxury brand of their own to sell.