Jonathan Ive's (RED) Leica M Camera

(RED) Leica M designed by Ive and Newson

Apple's Senior Vice President of Design Sir Jonathan Ive rarely design something outside of Apple products. But for the sake of charity he does it with pleasure. With Marc Newson, he designed a special (RED) Leica M camera then auctioned off, and the result is donated to charity through U2 frontman Bono's (RED) Global Fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria.

Both designers changed the original classic look of the Leica M camera into a modern design with a sleek, stylish Apple thew. The camera body wrapped with a single block of aluminum features more than 21.900 laser-engraved holes. This micro-holes in addition to filling the aesthetic appearance also has a practical function to strengthen grip. The entire process of redesigning the Leica M took more than 270 days with more than 50 engineers involved.

"Leica represents the confluence of precision engineering, world-class technology and design principles lens which elevate both function and form," said Ive, while Newson said that "The Leica object embodies the most iconographic qualities of a camera. It ended up being kind of a process of distillation and sort of concentration."

The (RED) Leica M finally has sold for more than $ 1.8 million at the RED charity auction at Sotheby's auction house in New York on 23 November 2013.