SANTA BARBARA, California – The Lexus RX has always been the gentleman’s crossover – an urbane, high-riding luxury car which prioritises comfort, ease of use and unparalleled refinement, rather than a sport utility vehicle with off-road pretensions. And that has not changed with the latest fifth-generation RX.

The new car is unmistakably an RX at a glance, albeit with its looks deftly tweaked. It retains the model’s familiar window-line and arched roof profile, while upfront is Lexus’ trademark “spindle grille” face, but with the top few rows blanked off so that only the intake elements on the lower portion of the “spindle” are actually permeable. There are fewer gratuitous bodywork creases and slashes, and the car looks all the better for it.