THE LYRIQ IS AS PRAGMATIC AS IT IS GROUNDBREAKING.
On the eve of Cadillac’s pivot to electrification, we note how the marque came to be defined by the vehicles at its lineup’s margins: the now ubiquitous Escalade SUV and a bunch of V-series supersedans. Stuff like the XT4, XT5, CT6, STS, CTS, and XTS came and largely went, instantly forgotten seemingly even by Cadillac. Those that still hang around today do so as uncompetitive placeholders that wait to be supplanted by an EV.
But where might Cadillac be today had it not poured resources into chasing the ghost of ’90s BMW “ultimate driving machine” glory? What if it had passed on building thrilling sport sedans that luxury customers were already shunning, instead leveraging the Escalade’s cachet on an excellent supporting cast of smaller, more mainstream SUVs? We think we found an answer: The Lyriq EV just might be the stunning, surprisingly excellent confluence of multiple Cadillac timelines.
