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We were so beguiled by AD’s bamboo-bound smartphone that we had to track down the designer to get some hands-on time with these work-in-progress prototypes. We met up with Kieron-Scott Woodhouse (pun unintended) and he offered to bring along several of the latest prototypes for us to get to grips with. While the finished product will arrive in the bamboo material but smoked to the darker finish. The darker model’s button layout is also closer to what we can expect on the final device. The ADZero is still set to launch between the end of 2012 and the start of 2013. Sustainable smartphone fans can browse through our gallery below, or read up on the phone’s journey — and our impressions — right after the break. The ADZero may hit plenty of sweet spots for smartphone buyers looking for something a little different. Unlike other wooden offerings, it uses fully sustainable bamboo, is British-designed, with special attention paid to the camera unit, which lays claim to its very own ring flash. It’s also running on Android. In a clever move, the technical specifications beneath that stylish shell aren’t set in stone, but promise to be comparable to what we’ll be seeing on other handsets by the end of the year. The good news is that it’ll be running Ice Cream Sandwich — meaning those physical buttons you see below the screen will disappear in the final model, replaced by on-screen versions like those used on the Galaxy Nexus. The OS will also pick up its own in-house skin …

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