Suicide doors? Not this time

DETROIT -- When it comes to Lincoln design, car buffs invariably recall the 1961 Lincoln Continental and its iconic suicide doors.

The internal debate over whether to repeat the doors became a major source of tension in the development of the MKR concept. Early on, most of the designers involved in the project pushed for rear-hinged suicide doors.

But the conflict was resolved by the team's commitment to keep the MKR a practical vehicle that could end up in showrooms. Conventional rear doors, hinged at the front, won out in part because they are more feasible for a production car.

Suicide doors are a "neat novelty," but the Lincoln team "didn't want to live in the past," said chief designer Gordon Platto. To make the MKR's doors distinctive for the concept stage, they are hung at a rakish upward angle of about 8 degrees.

The MKR's production feasibility, exhibited in part by those doors, makes it a departure from some other recent Lincoln concepts, said Xitij Mistry, the designer who drew the car's exterior.

Said Mistry: "Lincoln's past show cars were a bit indulgent as to what could be achieved."

Oddly, another controversial design element turned out to be the MKR's door handles. The Lincoln design team went "around and around" with design executives over the inner front door handles, described by Platto as "the most difficult piece" on the concept car.

After interior designer Jason Baldas experimented with as many as 50 different sketches during a three-month period, those handles ended up taking the form of the same sculptural pieces of metal envisioned in his first drawing.

"We wanted it to really be a statement in the vehicle," Baldas said. "So late one night I sat on the floor and sculpted it out myself. And then I hid it."

That breach of protocol -- clay modelers usually convert the sketches to finished form -- resulted in the flowing handles that later wowed the same design executives who had been uncertain about the sketches.

One of them was Pat Schiavone, the director who led Ford's car-design team when the MKR project was launched. "Pat didn't see it until it was done," Baldas said of the handle. "We just said it's going to be good."

Upon seeing the finished show car, Schiavone concurred -- about the handles and the overall design.

Said Schiavone: "I love it, love it, love it. To me, it almost looks like a production car, and that was a bit of a surprise. It's real, and that's a good thing."

You may e-mail Amy Wilson at [email protected]