1986 Cadillac Seville Elegante: Debustled!

It’s time again to go back to one of those luxury cars that were polarizing when new but look pretty nice today, compared to some of the rolling stock being foisted upon us in 2024. That’s right, the downsized ’86 Seville—buckle up! It’s one of those ’80s cars so many people love to hate, but I always liked them, especially the two-tone Elegantes, with their lush interiors.

I know I’ve done the ’86–91 Seville in the past, but recently my friend Dustin Carpenter dropped me a line: “I think it would be an interesting article to do on the transverse V-8 in the 1986 Seville.” By a nicely timed coincidence, my other friend (and frequent Broughamtastic photo contributor) Jayson Coombes sent me a link—to this car.

People familiar with the 1976–2004 Cadillac Seville would not be too out of line if they thought the second-gen, bustleback model came out before the “sheer” 1976 one. The bustleback was kind of an odd anomaly, so retro-classic compared to the original 1976 Seville, which was such a clean, uncluttered, almost muscular design. If the ’86 had come out in 1980 it would not have looked totally out of place alongside the new FWD X-cars.

But I’ll leave further speculation and what-ifs to the comments. As Dustin reminded me, the 1986 Seville was very different under the hood, along with the front-wheel-drive de Villes and Fleetwoods, both of which were drastically changed for 1985. The Fleetwood Brougham remained in its 1980 rear-wheel-drive, full-size style, all the way through 1989, though it became simply “Brougham” starting in 1987. Confusing? You bet!

At any rate, the bustleback 1980 Seville happened because soon-to-be-retired GM Design boss Bill Mitchell, who loved prewar classics (and pretty much anything else on wheels), meant to see it go into production before he sailed into the sunset. But it was unusual, as the original ’76 Seville was supposed to be a rather lean, clean alternative to the glitzier and much larger Cadillacs with which it shared showrooms.

At any rate, the ’80 came out, and while the styling was definitely a love-it-or-hate-it proposal, the model held its niche in the lineup all the way through 1985. And even in its sixth and final model year, 39,755 were sold, at a base price of $23,729.

And then, 1986 happened! GM had given fairly early notice that the E-bodied Seville and Eldorado (and siblings Riviera and Toronado) would be further downsized for the model year. This led a lot of folks to snap up ’85s, because they were uncertain of what the new cars might look like.

The ’86s retained the 4100 V-8, but its orientation changed from north-south to east-west, just like it had in the newly downsized Fleetwoods and de Villes the year before. The newly oriented 4.1-liter engine had digital fuel injection and produced 130 hp @ 4200 rpm. Curb weight was 3426.4 pounds. Another shock to traditional Cadillac customers was all Sevilles now had bucket seats with a center console with floor-shift. No front bench! No column shifter!

Sales dropped drastically: 19,098 ’86 Sevilles were built, with a base price of $26,756. Elegantes were $30,751 with full leather interior, $30,351 with Mayfair cloth/leather trim. Genuine American walnut trim was standard on all Elegantes, as well as the Eldorado Biarritz. The new Eldo and Seville were, by any standard, very different—and much smaller, but not as small as they looked. The problem was the styling somehow made them look smaller than they actually were.

There’s been an old chestnut about the Eldorado, Seville, Toronado, and Riviera being basically the N-body Buick Somerset, Oldsmobile Calais, and Pontiac Grand Am. Nothing could be further from the truth. The phenomenon was no different from the 1980 Cutlass sedans looking a lot like the 1976–79 Sevilles; they simply shared the au courant GM corporate look of the time.

A 1986 Skylark was 180.1 inches long, 66.6 inches wide, and 52.1 inches high, while the ’86 Seville was 188.2 inches long, 71.7 inches wide, and 53.7 inches high. It’s just that the design, with the 90-degree C-pillar and short trunk, made the Seville appear even smaller.

And as my friend Jayson said, the ’86 was kind of a shock after the ’85 Sevilles: “Oh yeah, way too small and too big of a change. And inside was too big of a change too. They weren’t the best generation but still made great two-tones.”

For the record, here are the colors in our featured car, identified by another fellow Cadillac buddy, Dave Smith, as Desert Beige over Black Cherry Pearlmist with a Black Cherry leather interior. I didn’t notice this at first, as initially I thought it was black and gold, even with the cherry leather.

As for this car itself, it was on eBay back in April and appeared to be in immaculate shape, with only 47,000 miles on it and everything functioning as it should, including the Automatic Climate Control.

As for this generation of Seville, it eventually did find favor with Cadillac buyers after the initial shock. While 1987 was even worse than ’86—only 18,578 were sold—things picked up for 1988 and the 4.1 V-8 was upsized to 4.5 liters, with 155 horsepower. A moderate facelift and new interior dressed things up, and an anti-lock braking system was newly available.

Sales figures tell the story: 22,968 in ’88, 20,422 (plus 1893 of the new, extra lush STS model) in ’89, 32,235 (STS included) in 1990, and 26,431 in ’91, the final year. It’s quite likely ’91 sales were off, despite the addition of the 4.9-liter V8, among the excitement of the upcoming all-new 1992 Seville, which was a gorgeous conveyance.

Was the ’86 the best? No, but it was pretty damn nice! And I’d love to find a Carmine Red 4.9-liter-V-8-powered ’91 STS with those gorgeous, solid wood door panels, saddle tan leather, and Allante-esque wheels!