The Acura Allure Supercar Concept Is a Luxury Lounge You Can Drive

More importantly, though, concepts help shape the trends of tomorrow, based on the desires of today. They might never materialize precisely in the way in which they’re shown in renders, but they will be there in one form or another.

As far as the auto industry is concerned, the consensus is that car ownership will see a major, transformational shift. The cars we own today with pride will perhaps be discarded in favor of ride-sharing services, and whatever vehicles will still be owned privately will have to have multi-functionality, or they simply won’t do.

Transportation design student Sung Nak Lee interned with Honda Americas in 2019, and his thesis during the internship was on an AV that would come to replace today’s cars. He released the concept, which he calls Acura Allure, earlier this month.

Acura Allure is a supercar in form and something entirely different (though not surprising) in function. It can still be driven like a regular car, in which case it would come to meet the need to forge a bond between man and machine. However, when it’s in fully autonomous mode, it’s more like a luxury lounge on wheels. The rear end is incredibly wide and offers plenty of space for socializing and, this way, establishing emotional bonds between passengers.

“I believe that interaction is the key factor for creating emotional attachment to something that doesn't have an emotion,” Lee explains. “There are two major interactions happening in the car: interactions with the machine and interactions with other passengers.”

Lee says the future is that of shared mobility, and, as such, car ownership is no longer valued, desired, or meaningful. What is valued, instead, is whatever emotional interaction you can have – either with an object or another person. This is where the Acura Allure’s multi-functionality comes in: it’s a machine that helps to do both, thanks to two different driving modes. Or modes of operation, better said.

Lounge Mode is the fully autonomous mode. The Acura Allure lacks a driver seat and controls, for the very simple reason that it doesn’t need the human operator. In the back, there’s a very spacious lounge-like sofa, on which two or maybe three people can chill in comfort. Interior surfaces can serve as screens and controls, so users can either consume entertainment content or socialize with each other.

In Engage Mode, the car is manually driven. The outer edges of the rear bench detach themselves and travel to the front, where they merge into a center driver seat. Controls become available, and the bond between man and machine is established. There’s still room for one passenger in the back, who can continue to take in the passing views or stream content.

The Acura Allure boasts “kinetic surface technology for active aero for different mode change” and a translucent surface. Its proportions are described as “alluring,” which probably explains the name: it’s low and wide, almost like a supercar, with an “aggressive, sporty face.” The design is meant to communicate performance, but also “premiumness.”

Lee doesn’t go into other details with this concept, but this being a car of the future, it would probably be silly to assume it runs on gas. So let’s just say the Acura Allure is also electric, in addition to being fully autonomous and high-performance, because it fits with the description of being a luxury lounge you can even drive whenever you feel like it.

At least Lee didn’t imagine a future in which driving your own car has become illegal, like the designer of the Nissan GT-R (X) 2050 did. Some things we can never let go of, not even for the sake of argument.