This is a rather beautiful concept for what the next-gen iPhone could look like, courtesy of French designer Antoine Brieux. . It’s fanciful stuff, of course, featuring a Liquid Metal casing, but what I find most interesting is this idea that the home button could be replaced with a “virtual home button” that displays on a larger 4.5-inch widescreen display.

While it may look pretty, Apple’s decision to build the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S almost entirely out of glass means that the handset isn’t really cut out for the dings and drops that our smartphones often have to endure. But the new iPhone could be a whole lot different. Built from liquidmetal, it could be one of the strongest smartphones money can buy.

Well, this is interesting timing. LiquidMetal — the space-age alloy that Apple already uses for the iPhone’s SIM ejection tool and which they licensed for future products — has just announced they are shipping commercial parts to several unnamed customers. Can anyone say LiquidMetal iPad 3?