Core77

Once upon a time there was Honda, Nissan and Toyota; then came Acura, Infiniti and Lexus.

Acura led the way as the world's first Japanese luxury marque, and today they open their brand-new $15 million Acura Design Studio in California. "The effort to distinguish Acura in the marketplace begins with design," said Dick Colliver, executive veep of both American Honda and Acura.

The state-of-the-art facility is LEED certified and features cool new technologies, like a virtual simulator that enables designers to whip up interactive car concepts at 1:1 scale. The new facility brings the number of U.S.-based Acura/Honda R&D facilities to 13, employing over 1,200 designers, engineers and support staffers, but we're guessing it's only us lucky designers who get to play with the full-scale simulator.