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recognizes the importance of the background of a given brand. "You have to think about the essence of what makes a brand. Its nationality. History. Heritage. How it is looked upon by customers, both good and bad. You have to work from that." Which brings us to the point of Lincoln. "With Lincoln," he says, "we have a great foundation to build on. The work that Moray [Callum] and Max [Wolff] initiated**, this series of cars during the past few years, is actually very good. They've got emotion built into them. They have advancement built into them." Yet he makes a point that is often trotted out by those who point to the past, to cars that Once Were. "It is a default to always go back to what Lincoln was in the '50s and '60s," he says. "I love those iconic Lincolns. But you have to question their relevance to the customer today. "This always has to be a point of refer- ence to us: What is the contemporary state of the art? What is the relevance in this day and age?" But this does not mean that you rele- gate the cars of the past to the collec- tion at The Henry Ford Museum. "There is value in heritage," Woodhouse says. "You can be informed by it, inspired by it, but you can't be locked into it." He says that there should be "emotional touch points to the elegant, beautiful, iconic Lincolns of the past," but he recognizes that he and his design team must be developing cars that are emotionally connecting products for the consumers of today and tomorrow. It is almost dogma that a premium brand has to have a massive rear-drive sedan in order to be, well, a premium brand. And it has been announced that Lincoln will have an all-new, full-size sedan in 2016. Yet Woodhouse states: "We're not going to be doing land yachts," adding, "There is the issue of relevance. "The default that luxury is only a big, masculine car is in the past. It is gone. "We have to look at luxury with a new outlook, a new mindset." Lincoln's primary growth in the next few years is going to be predicated on its performance in China. There, it seems, "large" is somewhat synony- mous with "luxury." And Woodhouse admits, "A lot of the 'L' versions for China"—the luxury cars with stretched wheelbases, especially to accommodate rear-seat passengers—"have relevance for that market." So while Lincoln will have a big car (and it has the BIG Navigator SUV), Woodhouse seems to be suggesting (as he's not going to be showing his hand regarding future products) that within the Lincoln design studio in Dearborn they are crafting luxury and quality in a way that is contemporary in a way that even Marc Newson would admire. u The Ford 021C Concept car that was introduced in 1999 and designed by . . . Marc Newson. u Woodhouse's parents owned a garage when he was growing up in Worchester. Some people say they've "always" been involved with cars. Woodhouse truly has. *Or what he did, as Newson joined the Apple design team in September, and Apple certainly has a design language and form that is no less corporately consumer focused than, say, Lincoln. **Callum is vice president, Design, for Ford, with responsibility for Ford and Lincoln products. Wolff is Lincoln Exterior Design Chief (see: autofieldguide. com/articles/max-wolff- leading-lincoln-design) AD&P; > November 2014 > FEATURE > Relevance as a Precursor to Elegance: Creating Lincoln Design > Gary S. Vasilash > gsv@autofieldguide.com 28