Category: Buick LaCrosse

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LaCrosse GL Concept Refines Buick’s Signature Style

Elegant forms, warm hues and inviting materials preview possible design direction

LOS ANGELES – When designers set out to capture the essence of Buick luxury for the LaCrosse GL concept vehicle, they looked to the fine cuisine, heirloom objects and enriching experiences the brand’s customers savor. The design study is on display at the L.A. Auto Show through Nov. 17.

Buick’s color and trim designers worked from a palette of cabernet red, dark cocoa brown and caramel choccachino. They took inspiration from the burnished metal of antique jewelry, ombré patina on vintage guitars and flocked lining of keepsake boxes. For GL’s French-stitched premium leather seats, the designers looked to the understated elegance of classic club chairs and contours of windswept sand dunes. And their use of smooth suede for the headliner is designed to invite one’s touch like a favorite pair of gloves.

“The LaCrosse GL concept expresses Buick’s distinctly human kind of luxury – one that is as warmly inviting as it is elegant and refined,” said David Lyon, executive director of design. “The design cues that already distinguish the production LaCrosse – such as the premium leather-upholstered seats, ice blue ambient lighting and soft touch surfaces – are amplified in the GL and serve as inspiration for future Buick models.”

LaCrosse GL’s cabernet red exterior paint is complemented by brushed and tinted chrome accents on the grille, door handles and deck lid, as well as around the windows, taillights and headlights. Machine-face, satin-finish 20-inch rims fill the wheel wells for a firmly planted appearance.

“The brushed-and-tinted chrome trim gives the GL a more subdued appearance than if we had used bright chrome. The overall effect is more in keeping with Buick’s quietly confident aesthetic,” said Magdalena Kokoszynska, creative designer on LaCrosse GL.

Open the GL’s doors and backlit Buick-emblazoned sill plates invite one to enter like illuminated welcome mats.

Take a seat and one is ensconced in luxury, enveloped by flowing sculptural surfaces finished in a rich blend of warm-hued materials. They offer soft-touch refinement and surprise-and-delight details. The seats, doors and instrument panel surfaces are finished in contrasting dark cocoa brown and caramel choccachino leather. The seat cushions’ pillowed surfaces evoke windswept sand dunes, and the ice-blue French stitching along their seams harmonize with Buick’s signature ambient lighting.

Overhead, one finds a rich choccachino suede headliner – a material and usage rarely seen in anything but the most luxurious automotive interiors. This butter-soft material also accents the steering wheel, inviting one’s touch.

Like the GL’s exterior trim pieces, the interior metal accents on the instrument cluster and center stack controls are a darker, warmer hue, and are complemented by the swirling grain of wood trim on the steering wheel and dash that evokes the ombré patina fade found on classic Gibson Les Paul guitars.

Attention to detail also is evident underfoot, where leather-surged and accent-stitched floor mats offer further refinement. Likewise, the storage compartments are flocked like the interior of a jewel box.

“Every surface in the interior of the LaCrosse GL has been crafted with the knowledge that Buick customers enjoy the finer things in life, but don’t need to flaunt it,” Kokoszynska said.

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2011 Buick LaCrosse Earns NHTSA Five-Star Overall Safety Rating

Highest possible overall vehicle score for safety achieved in new, more stringent testing

DETROIT – The 2011 Buick LaCrosse received a five-star overall safety rating in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s New Car Assessment Program (www.SaferCar.gov), the agency has announced. Starting with 2011 models, NHTSA has introduced tougher tests and more rigorous requirements for its five-star ratings that provide more information about safety feature performance and crash-avoidance technologies.

The LaCrosse received five-star ratings for both the Overall Frontal Crash and Overall Side Crash. These crash test ratings are intrumental in helping prospective car shoppers evaluate the safety performance of new vehicles.

“Car buyers today want the peace of mind that comes with buying a vehicle they know will help protect their family,” said Tony DiSalle, vice president of Buick marketing. “This five-star overall vehicle score for safety shows Buick can equip an affordable luxury midsize sedan with top safety features.”

The LaCrosse offers these safety features:

  • Intelligent technologies delivering a “360-degree” field of vision behind the steering wheel for a greater feeling of comfort, control and safety
  • Side blind zone alert technology notifying the driver if a vehicle in adjacent lanes is traveling in the driver’s blind spot
  • Rearview camera system featuring a display integrated into the navigation system screen
  • Front- and side-impact air bags as well as roof-mounted head-curtain air bags that help protect occupants in the event of a rollover crash
  • An advanced front-seat safety belt system including a dynamic locking latchplate, dual pretensioners that help tighten the safety belt for earlier restraint of the occupant during the onset of moderate to severe crashes; and load limiters that help limit the forces on the occupant to help reduce the risk of injury
  • GM’s StabiliTrak stability- and traction-control system
  • OnStar (included for the first year of ownership)

GM engineers developed the dynamic locking latchplate, which is part of the front safety belt system. It locks under dynamic crash loading to help securely restrain the occupant’s pelvis, and it works in concert with the safety belt load limiting feature to control loads on the occupant’s upper torso. This safety feature helped the LaCrosse achieve the five-star frontal crash rating for both driver and front-seat passenger.

 

 

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Buick IntelliLink Coming to 2012 Regal, LaCrosse and Verano

Hands-free, voice-controlled interface helps drivers safely use mobile electronics

NEW YORK – Buick, the fastest-growing major automotive brand in the United States in 2010, will bring a higher level of in-vehicle wireless connectivity and customizable infotainment options to its 2012 Verano,Regal and LaCrosse models. The upgraded capability will enhance the luxury vehicle experience that Buick buyers have come to know and love.

Buick IntelliLink uses Bluetooth or USB to connect the driver’s smartphone to a new 7- or 8-inch, high-resolution, full-color touch screen display radio. IntelliLink expands on Buick’s current Bluetooth and USB capabilities to allow smartphone control via voice activation and steering wheel-mounted controls. It also enables streaming stereo audio from the phone through services like PANDORA® Internet radio andStitcher SmartRadio®.

Most importantly, Buick IntelliLink enables seamless integration of stowed portable devices with each vehicle’s infotainment system, allowing drivers to keep their hands on the wheel and eyes on the road.

“Today’s tech-savvy consumers expect more from their cars’ infotainment systems,” said Tony DiSalle, U.S. vice president of Buick Marketing. “They want a system that allows them to customize their in-vehicle experience with smartphones and other portable media devices. The availability of IntelliLink on every Buick sedan in 2012 and every Buick model in 2013 takes connectivity and media personalization to a new level.”

Consumer interest in onboard connectivity is rising with smartphone sales. Apple sold 16.2 million iPhonesin the fourth quarter of 2010, and Android sales jumped 886 percent from 2009 to 2010. By the end of 2013, there will be 1.1 billion smartphones with annual sales of 300 million units, according to the research firm Parks Associates Industries.

“About 70 percent of all new car buyers want some form of connectivity,” said Micky Bly, executive director leading GM’s infotainment engineering efforts, citing GM research. “Whether it’s because they want to listen to their favorite music or explore local restaurants on a Friday night, today’s car buyer expects so much more out of their time in a car.”

One doesn’t need a smartphone to benefit from IntelliLink. The system works with a Bluetooth-enabled cell phone, USB flash drive or digital audio player. Even without a mobile device, Buick owners will benefit from IntelliLink’s enhanced voice recognition technology and OnStar’s on-screen turn-by-turn directions.

IntelliLink’s voice activation capability benefits from Buick’s library-quiet interiors. Quiet Tuning systems, processes and components are built into every facet of the vehicle’s architecture to block or absorb sound and dampen or eliminate vibrations. Quiet Tuning also calls attention to the audio fidelity of Buick’s Bose®and harmon/kardon® sound systems.

Additional benefits provided by IntelliLink include:

Enhanced hands-free voice control system powered by Nuance®, which allows simple voice commands to initiate phone calls and select radio stations or media from portable MP3 players and smartphones. A tap of a button on the steering wheel enables intuitive verbal control of many radio features like “play (artist name)” or “call (name of contact)”. When a smart phone is connected you can say “tune (Internet radio, station name).”

PANDORA Internet radio and Stitcher SmartRadio allow users to create personalized radio stations based on favorite artists or genres and enables access to thousands of audio programming choices, allowing customers to build a personalized listening experience. IntelliLink integrates control of both of these apps for a driver-directed listening experience.

Gracenote® identifies the music collection on the driver’s USB device, MP3 player or smartphone and presents information such as artist name, genres and album cover art on the IntelliLink screen and enables users to select similar music to the tunes they love. Gracenote also improves the accuracy of IntelliLink’s voice activation system by allowing users to access music using artist nicknames, such as “The Boss,” “The Stones,” or “Snoop” using IntelliLink’s voice control interfaces activated through the touch-screen or steering wheel buttons.

Upgraded USB connectivity adds the ability to play music files directly from flash memory devices and gives the customer the ability to update IntelliLink with future feature enhancements.

Buick IntelliLink’s designers drew inspiration from the intuitive, easy-to-use interfaces found on many popular consumer electronics. The influence can be seen on the home page with application icons that animate when activated. The touch screen’s fluid, contemporary graphics and elegant color palette evoke Buick’s “inviting luxury” aesthetic and advance the sophisticated design language established in the current LaCrosse’s navigation system.

The debut of Buick IntelliLink extends the OnStar experience from safety and security to information and entertainment by seamlessly integrating the capability of a smartphone into the vehicle so that hand-held phones may be safely stowed while driving.

When OnStar debuted in 1996, it pioneered in-vehicle connectivity with the auto industry’s first embedded telematics system. It has grown from primarily offering automatic crash notification and security features to include remote vehicle diagnostics, turn-by-turn navigation and the ability to slow down stolen vehicles. In November 2010, OnStar released a smartphone application for all 2011 Buick vehicles that incorporated remote start, lock/unlock, and vehicle status checks.