Designed together with Kansai Yamamoto

Mar 25, 2008 18:54 GMT  ·  By

Luxury mobile phones seem to never be enough, therefore Toshiba decided to launch a new handset that will cost several thousands of dollars. Named Cosmic Shiner, the new device will be dressed in diamonds and will feature different custom-made cases created in collaboration with Kansai Yamamoto, a famous Japanese fashion designer.

The handset should come (to all those who can afford it) in a handmade box that includes three luxurious face plates that can be easily attached to the phone, giving it an exclusive look.

The most eccentric aspect about Cosmic Shiner is the way it can be bought. More exactly, if you want it you first have to buy an April issue of Seven Hills, a Japanese lifestyle magazine, get an ID code that will presumably be there and only then, with that code, you can order the phone. Its price is 399,000 yen, meaning almost $4,000, and there will only be 1,000 models available.

Cosmic Shiner is actually the luxury edition of Toshiba 815T, a handset that came until now in quite many versions, including a Hello Kitty one, a FanFun one (with countless customizable options) and even a robot-like one that we spotted quite recently.

Putting aside the diamonds and fashionable cases, Cosmic Shiner from Toshiba is what you'd call a mid-end mobile phone. The device comes in a clamshell form factor, weighs 107 grams and measures 102 x 50 x 16 millimeters (when closed). Its features include 3G connectivity, a 2 Megapixel camera with video, a 2.4 inch internal display with 240 x 320 pixels, a 0.8 inch external display (96 x 39 pixels), Multimedia player and microSD card support for up to 2GB.

Is it worth $4,000? Probably not, but rich people don't really care about worthing or not worthing when it comes to buying devices that allow them to stand out.