My phone is truly a beautiful piece of engineering and design. Unfortunately I haven't had much of a chance to "admire" it's beauty. I don't really care about such things, I got this mostly for it's specs.
For the past two and a half years the design has been hidden by the protective case. Today I have been forced to use the phone without the case. The protective film I had on the screen that turns the glossy screen matte (another design fail in my opinion) has been serving it's duty well, but showed it's age with edges starting to peel of. Luckily the film came in a box of two, so I had a replacement already at hand. But after applying the film the glue is recommended to be let to dry for 12 hours before using any casing.
Using a protective case is a must. First of all, the curved glass front is extremely fragile no matter what the marketing says. The nice, smooth metallic back would probably scratch from a slight breeze. So I want to keep it protected as much as possible.
Even if the phone with it's current design would be done with indestructibe materials it would still need to be put in some sort of case. The smooth surfaces and round shape makes it hard to keep the phone in hand comfortably. It feels like it could slip out of my hand any moment. And that edge to edge curved screen makes it even harder to hold the phone securely at hand without initiating any unintended touch gestures.