Smartphones get dressed up in designer looks

Fashion brand Prada will be teaming up with electronics-maker LG again to create the third device in the Prada Phone by LG range. The phone would be ready for a launch in early 2012.

Fashion brand Prada will be teaming up with electronics-maker LG again to create the third device in the Prada Phone by LG range. The companies expect to have the Prada Phone by LG 3.0 dressed up and ready for an early 2012 launch.

'The partnership between Prada and LG has always been characterised by an innovative approach and uncompromised quality of style, design and breakthrough technology,' said Patrizio Bertelli, CEO of PRADA Group.

'These values are common to both our brands, which have always anticipated, and often set, the trends in many fields. We were therefore delighted to cooperate again with LG in the development of the latest creation of the mobile communication industry.'

Designer handsets appear to be the flavor of the moment: the $6,700 Android-based Tag Heuer Link phone launched in July; Dior released a diamond-encrusted €85,000 'Reveries' phone in August; in November Samsung teamed up with Hugo Boss to release the €279 Samsung Galaxy Ace in France; and the €300 LG E906 luxury Windows Phone, a collaboration between fashion brand Jil Sander and LG, arrived on the market on November 23.

The original Prada phone by LG arrived on the market in 2007 and proved to be a hit with brand-loving consumers. The handset was the world's first touchscreen mobile phone and LG sold more than one million units around the globe. It also became a fashion icon in its own right, securing a permanent place in New York City's Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Shanghai.