Okay, so functionally the 2009 Honda Pilot is a pretty strong player in the crossover segment. It's roomy, has more power and better gas mileage than its predecessor, and it's built like, well, a Honda. But why, oh why does it have to look like it was designed on the back of an envelope with a set-square and a pencil?

This new Pilot's a stolid, stodgy piece of work. And if the goggle-eye headlights and gaping chrome-ringed grille are an attempt to create some visual interest around the front end, it's backfired -- they just look they've been slapped on to fill up the space. Sure, the Pilot's basically a box-on-wheels. But that doesn't mean it can't have flair. The new Ford Flex is a box-on-wheels, too, but there's a coolly restrained elegance to its execution the hapless Honda just can't match.

The worrying thing is this new Pilot follows hard on the heels of the disappointingly lumpen 2008 Accord sedan. With few exceptions -- the current Civic sedan being one of them -- Hondas have never been automotive design benchmarks. But they've never looked quite as clumsy as this pair.

Now maybe that's no big deal; maybe the thousands of buyers who'll choose an Accord or a Pilot simply because they want a nice, reliable, safe automotive appliance won't be bothered by the way it looks. (Although I'd argue the sales success of the current Malibu proves style counts for something, even at the appliance-car end of the market.) Honda can probably ride out a few design duds, but Acura is a different story.

In the premium segment where Honda wants Acura to play, style is as important as substance, especially if you want to take on the all-powerful German brands. Which is why it's hard to figure out what on earth Honda is thinking when it comes to Acura's new design direction.

I've quite liked a number of recent Acuras -- the TL sedan is still one of the sharpest looking front drive four doors of its size in the business. So when Honda unveiled the Acura Advanced Concept Sedan at the 2006 LA Show, I thought it was a joke. But nope, this cartoonish sedan -- which ranks with the awful Mercedes-Benz F700 as one of the worst looking design studies from a major automaker in the past decade -- is apparently the "religion car" for Acura design.

You can see it in the pronounced fender flares, sharp character lines, and garish grilles of the new Acura MDX and TSX, neither of which have the understated elegance of the vehicles they replaced. That overpowering shield-like grille theme has also popped up on a gawky mid-life facelift of the RL sedan. Against this background, the prospects for the next-gen TL, now the oldest and best looking car in the Acura lineup, aren't great.

Maybe the design guys at Honda looked at what BMW did under the direction of Chris Bangle, and decided Acura, too, needed to be different to make a splash in the premium car segment. But they forgot that most people were prepared to look past some of Bangle's more confronting designs just to own something -- anything -- with the BMW badge. And they forgot a priceless piece of advice from legendary GM design chief Bill Mitchell, the man behind some of the best looking cars ever made: "Walking through the lobby of the Waldorf Astoria with your fly undone is different. But it's not good."