Installing Icons

Everything you need is in the set. Nothing else is required.

• 1 ICON engineered with a cut-out to accommodate the iPhone camera lens
• 3 identical ICONS without cutaway
• 2 sets of 4 C4 custom 3M adhesives
• Alcohol cleaning pad
• Single-use 3M primer ampule
• Wooden trimming tool

Corners4 were designed as a non-permanent, non-destructive application. Applied correctly, they will absolutely stay in place. Take ten unhurried minutes over it.

1. Step 01

   Lay everything out

   Put the phone and all the parts on the protective paper the set ships on, on a clean flat surface in good light. Take any existing case off — Corners4 bond to a bare iPhone.

2. Step 02

   Clean all four corners

   Wipe each corner of the phone thoroughly with the alcohol cleaning pad, covering the front glass, the rear glass and the band between them. Let it dry completely. Skin oil is what stops an adhesive bonding, so a corner that looks clean but has been handled all day is not.

3. Step 03

   Break the primer seal

   Squeeze the primer ampule at the black dot until the seal breaks and the liquid flows into the tip.

4. Step 04

   Prime the phone

   Apply the primer to all four corners of the phone — the top and bottom glass and the edges between them.

5. Step 05

   Prime the ICONs

   Apply the primer to the inside surfaces of each ICON, where the adhesive will sit.

6. Step 06

   Apply the adhesives

   Press an adhesive strip firmly onto each corner of the phone, then peel away the white protective backing.

7. Step 07

   Seat the ICONs

   Slide each ICON into place, wiggling it forward onto the corner, then apply firm pressure — ICON to phone — for 30 seconds. The ICON with the single cut goes on the corner nearest the camera lens. Press straight in rather than twisting: a rotational movement while the adhesive is grabbing shears the bond before it forms.

8. Step 08

   Leave it alone for 24 hours

   It takes about 24 hours for the adhesive to reach full adhesion. For that first day, take care not to pull or snag the Corners — no pockets full of keys, no peeling at an edge to check it is stuck.

This is the difference that justifies a separate guide. An Original is rotationally forgiving; an ICON is not. Each piece has a face, and that face has an orientation relative to the phone. A Buddha installed at an angle reads as a mistake from across a room, and once the adhesive has set you will be spending a strip from your second set to fix it.

So dry-fit all four before committing any of them. Hold each piece in position without pressing, look at the phone from directly above, and check the four faces are consistent with one another as well as square to the phone. A rotated corner is much easier to see when its three neighbours are there to compare against.

One ICON in every set is engineered with a single cut to accommodate the camera lens. That piece goes on the corner nearest the camera.

This is what the second set of adhesives is for. A misaligned corner on a first installation is normal, not a defect.

1. Pull the piece off with a firm finger. The adhesive is non-permanent and comes away without taking the phone's finish with it.
2. Remove all adhesive from inside the piece — a pair of tweezers is ideal — and rub any residue off the phone with your hand or a soft cloth.
3. Clean and dry both surfaces again.
4. Apply a fresh adhesive strip from the second set and repeat the seating steps.

Never re-use a strip. Once a piece has been removed the original adhesive loses some of its tack, which is why a second full set ships in every box.

Anodised aluminium is hard and durable and needs nothing special day to day. Wipe the Corners as you would the phone, and avoid abrasive cleaners and solvents, which dull a polished finish and flatten the contrast on a sculpted one.

To remove a set, pull each piece off with a firm finger and rub away any residue. Because removal is non-destructive, a set can come off before a repair, a trade-in or a resale without leaving evidence it was ever there.

To move a set to a replacement phone of the same model, remove it, clean both the pieces and the new phone, and apply fresh strips.