Everyone should copy Asus’ gorgeous laptop color accents

Speak to any designer of modern gadgets and you’ll hear plenty of frustration with the creative constraints imposed by having to build ever-thinner, ever-lighter devices. There’s just not much room for flair and expression when the thing you’re building is thinner than a pack of gum. But Asus has found a sliver of space to assert its design uniqueness by blasting the edges of its new ZenBook Flip S and ZenBook Deluxe laptops with a lick of glorious golden color.

This design element was first introduced by Asus with the original ZenBook 3 unveiling last year, and it seems to have been refined and updated for the Deluxe model as well as expanded to include the brand new Flip S. The convertible Flip S has the color accent on its keyboard section, whereas the ultra-thin ZenBook Deluxe has it framing the top lid. In both cases, I find it an absolutely gorgeous yet subtle enhancement to the laptop’s look, whether the main color is silver or navy blue — and I’d welcome more companies embracing this idea. A cynic might suggest that this is just a remix of the typical (and overdone) chrome effect that companies like to apply to technological products and car window frames, but cynics say a lot of silly things. I just can’t help fantasizing about a matte-black ThinkPad with a thin red streak around its edges, signaling the power contained within.