Most Americans know very little of the Toyota Alphard. It's basically one of Toyota's JDM minivans, although it's also frequently used as a limousine too. It's kind of funky and cool in a totally Japanese way. While we've gotten the moderately cool Previa in the States, that model was unfortunately followed up by the competent but forgettable Sienna. We've sadly never seen an Alphard on these shores before, so you can imagine our surprise when we saw one right out front of the South Hall at SEMA.

It's kind of hard to recognize it in its current guise, but this is the van that Toyota has been using to study possible changes for its 2011 Sienna which will debut at the LA Auto Show next month. This particular Alphard, however, has apparently been through some type of transporter malfunction, having turned itself inside-out. That red exterior is actually leather, or possibly pleather. The "stickers" on the front fenders are actually stitched in too. We see ACC Inc., Air Bomber, Fat Moon, Rotora, Bellof, Forgiato, Wald, Proxes and Eskan, and that's as far as we managed to get before we had the inexplicable urge to go off in search of red velvet cake.


Gallery: SEMA 2009: Black Bison Toyota Alphard



Photos copyright (C)2009 Frank Filipponio/Weblogs, Inc.