IT has long been an industry joke that the ultimate Apple design would simply be a piece of glass. Well such teasing may not be far off the mark after it was revealed Apple has been granted an exclusive patent to create “all-glass” casings.

    Picked up by AppleInsider, patent No. 8,773, 848 awarded by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on 8 July covers “Fused glass device housings” and lists Jonathan Ive amongst the applicants.

    An extract from the patent explains Apple now has the rights covering “An electronic device [which] may have a glass housing structures. The glass housing structures may be used to cover a display and other internal electronic device components. The glass housing structure may have multiple glass pieces that are joined using a glass fusing process.”

    Of course on the surface making an iPhone from glass sounds ridiculous. Cracked iPhone screens are famously common with research claiming 26 percent of iPhone screens crack within 2 years. Furthermore Apple has used glass front and backs before with the iPhone 4 and 4S. Bt it swapped back to metal for the iPhone 5 and 5S and the leaked iPhone 6 dummy units appear to use more metal than ever before.

    So what has Apple considering a seemingly ill-advised U-turn? In word: Sapphire.

    Earlier this week an iPhone 6 facia leaked confirming long time rumors that the new handset will have a Sapphire crystal display. A move away from the Corning Gorilla Glass used in previous iPhones and by most smartphone and tablet rivals.

    In the video from Marcques Brownlee that resulted from the leak, the key attribute of Sapphire became clear to all: its durability. Not only did it withstand vigorous scratch attempts by keys and a knife, it also bends like no other material it has been seen previously in handset design — even including the flexible LG G Flex and Samsung Galaxy Round.

    Therefore it isn’t a stretch to see Apple using Sapphire front and back in a future iPhone and even an iPad. Noticeably the patent points out the finish can be colored to hide internal components and fused to create a seamless fit — the ultimate extension of Apple’s unibody concept. (SD-Agencies)