The people who covered this Lexus IS with LEDs did a tremendously thorough job. You can tell that's the case just by looking at the number of light emitting diodes they had installed: 41,999.
It's likely they had one LED left, but after minutes of searching for an empty spot on the car's body to fit it, they could not find one. The round number was not to be achieved, making the Lexus LIT IS' LED count sound like a Black Friday promotion price.
The odd number could have other explanations as well. It could be the case that they bought 42,000 LEDs and installed them all, only for one technician to go home and find one he had forgotten in his pocket. With the car already shipped, it was too late to do anything about it, so 41,999 it is. Or it could have simply been a publicity gimmick meant to make OCD people like me ramble on about it for two paragraphs.
Whatever the case, the Lexus LIT IS is an eye-catcher. The car looks like a mobile advertising billboard, and at any point you expect the lights to form the Coca-Cola logo or that of some other famous brand. Only they don't, bacause the LIT IS was developed by Lexus and Lexus alone.
The reference to Rihanna's song is all the more entitled given the sharp edges of the IS' design and the multitude of surfaces they produce. However, its connection with the world of music goes far beyond a made up title: the LED-covered IS was created for Dua Lipa's new music video for her hit song "Be the One."
As you would expect, Lexus will continue to use the car even after its few seconds of fame in the video for various promotional events. And it makes sense: the LIT IS is absolutely breathtaking.
It produces up to 175,000 lumens and uses 5,280 feet of wire (that's 1.6 km or roughly one mile). The lights are completely programmable and offer three different functioning modes: Attract mode turns the LIT IS into a giant peacock displaying its full range of colors. Musci Viz mode is one way of letting people on the outside know why you're bopping your head at the wheel; finally, the Gesture mode allows users to control the LEDs by hand movements thanks to the integration of a gaming console.
While the LIT IS is fully driveable, you won't be able to set foot on public roads without the envious police cars with their puny little light bars pulling you over. It would still be the perfect car to have parked on your driveway. You would definitely win the neighborhood's lights contest this Christmas.
"Boy meets car, boy loves car, boy gets journalism degree and starts job writing and editing at a car magazine" - 5/5. (Vlad Mitrache if he was a movie) Full profile
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