‘This Lexus is so cramped, I felt like corned beef’: Clarkson reviews the Lexus LBX

The LBX is supposed to be small but it’s also supposed to be luxurious. They got it half-right, I suppose.

Good looking: the Lexus LBX Premium Plus

If you are very old, you will remember the Renault 5. But you will almost certainly not remember a version of it called the Monaco. Which is weird as it was a very important car, a car that launched a brilliant trend, a trend that never caught on. Even though it should have done. Back then in the late ’80s, all the mainstream carmakers were engaged in a mad rush to see who could make the fastest, grippiest, maddest hot hatchback. Hot hatchbacks were massively popular because they cost no more to repair than a normal hatchback, but they went like stink. They were sports cars into which you could fit a dog and some children. They were brilliant.

And it was important for a carmaker to say that theirs was the fastest of them all. So they were using trick differentials and four-wheel drive and as many valves per cylinder as would fit. And then along came MG, which fitted the hot Maestro with a turbo the size of a wheelie bin. It was so big the car would go from 0 to 100km/h only once. Then it would explode.

Over in Japan, Daihatsu ­announced it had managed to ­extricate 100 horsepower from a one-litre engine, while in Europe Lancia and Ford were engaged in a bare-chested festival of lunacy with the increasingly mad Delta Integrale and the Escort Cosworth. These were fantastic, heady, delirious times. A period when the bars of Fulham echoed every night to relentless arguments about which was best: the Volkswagen Golf GTI or the Peugeot 205 GTi.

Then along came Renault, no strangers to the idea of hot hatchbacks. They made some stunners, including the mid-engined 5 that wasn’t even a hatchback at all. But they realised that not everyone who wanted a hatchback wanted to go round corners at 400km/h. Some people, they figured, would prefer some comfort and quietness. So they came up with the long-forgotten 5 Monaco.

Here was a small hatchback that, instead of red stripes, fat tyres and a rear spoiler the size of a squash court, had thick carpets and sumptuous leather ­upholstery. It was for BMW or Mercedes drivers who wanted something small and convenient for urban life but didn’t want to sacrifice the cow- and wool-based luxury. It was a clever idea, and it didn’t catch on.

I’ve racked my brains, and since it was axed the only follow-up I can think of was the hilariously awful Aston Martin Cygnet. But this wasn’t the same, really. It was a Toyota IQ with an Aston badge and it was created not for someone who wanted a pint-sized supercar but solely to get round one of the EU’s more hare-brained regulations on emissions.

I don’t get it. You don’t pay big money for a Rolls-Royce because it’s big but because it’s quiet and cosseting and it rides beautifully. And a small car can be like that. So why has the small luxury car never become a thing? All of which brings me on to the Lexus LBX. This, in theory, is an ordinary Toyota Yaris Cross full of luxury Lexus goodness. A modern-day Monaco. For the person who wants everything they would normally get from a big car. In a small car.

Lexus LBX Premium Plus

They’ve certainly made a lot of effort on small unseen things to disguise the fact that it started out in life as a Yaris on stilts. But it does have the same engine, I’m afraid. A hybridised, three-cylinder 1.5-litre. Self-charging. Super economical. And not interesting. Or powerful. Or fun in any way. It’s all about ­exploiting the medium. Medium throttle movements. Medium power delivery. Medium braking.

If you put your foot down – and let’s be honest, you won’t because this isn’t that sort of car – you’d go from 0 to 100km/h in 9.2 seconds. Which is about what ordinary hatchbacks did in 1989. If you want it to take even longer than that, there’s a four-wheel-drive version that’s noticeably slower.

It’s fair to say this car was not designed with the motoring enthusiast in mind, a point hammered home by the CVT gearbox. If you want a lot of noise and a sense that the clutch is slipping, this technology works very well. But I don’t. It’s odd and annoying and makes everything much louder than is necessary, which is not what you want in a “luxury” car.

Handling? Well, I didn’t crash so it’s got some, I suppose, but the steering, the brakes and the cornering are all mostly forgettable. Actually, they must be because I’ve forgotten about them already and I only drove the car yesterday.

Inside the cabin

But, and this is where things get important, none of this mechanical mush matters one jot because the Lexus is not aimed at the hard-charging youth. It’s aimed, as I said, at the person who wants all the accoutrements of gracious living that you get in a large car in a package that’s easy to park. Alas, it fails on this front too. Sure, you get a snazzy stereo and a clever air filter and a camera washer and a head-up display, but these are gimmicks and gadgets. If items like this defined “luxury”, then your local branch of Dixons would be the most luxurious place on Earth, and it isn’t. In the LBX your feet don’t sink into the carpets, the leather isn’t soft and it all feels a bit gloomy. And gloominess is not something that’s ever been associated with luxury either.

Sure, it all feels extremely well put together, but I can’t imagine that the much cheaper Yaris is full of cross-threaded screws and wonky wiring. Which brings me on to the price. The front-wheel-drive car I tested is north of £35,000 in the UK ($69,000), but if you go for even more gadgets and four-wheel drive you can take that to beyond £40,000. Which might just about be justifiable if it was a nice place to sit. But it isn’t, principally because it’s so cramped. When I climbed aboard I got a pretty good idea of what it might be like to be corned beef. Things are even worse in the back, where there’s not enough room for any known human life form. The boot’s tiny too.

So what we have here is a small, expensive car that’s not fast, exciting or trimmed to anything like the right level. I’d say if you wanted an eco-box like this you’d be far better off buying a Toyota Yaris. Or, if you really do like the idea of a small luxurious car, comb the second-hand websites. Because I saw a Renault 5 Monaco on there last week for £5,000.

LEXUS LBX PREMIUM PLUS

EINGINE: 1.5-litre three-cylinder turbo petrol, plus electric motor

PERFORMANCE: 0-100km/h 9.2 seconds, top speed 170km/h

PRICE: LBX range from $55,000

JEREMY’S RATING: 3 out of 5