Sony Ericsson has released the full spec for the distinctively designed Xperia Pureness. Like LG’s Crystal, the Pureness’ headline feature is a transparent body. But while it’s the keypad that’s see-through with the Crystal, Sony Ericsson have gone for the bokners option of a phone with a transparent screen.

Sony Ericsson’s new style phone seems to hope to attract buyers pretty much on this mad design feature alone, as the rest of the spec is worryingly basic for a handset that will carry a price upwards of £500 when it goes on sale later this month.

The see-through screen is just 1.8in in size – positively miniscule by today’s standards – and worse still it’s monochrome. As in not colour. Other tickboxes that remain unchecked include basic features like a camera, along with GPS and Wi-Fi.

Sony Ericsson is branding this as a fashion phone, focusing on its unique design as a selling point in itself. And it’s hardly surprising, as it’s this very feature that’s responsible for the lack of others, with a camera having no place in a see-through body, after all.

In reality the Sony Ericsson Xperia Pureness about succeeds in its primary mandate. Its looks are certainly eyecatching, and at 13mm thick and weighing 70g, it’s slender too. It also benefits from novelty Xperia services like a dedicated support line and global replacement within 48 hours, plus it has its own personal concierge service, which can book you into health clubs, restaurants and the like.

And indeed novelty seems to be the name of the game with the Sony Ericsson Xperia range, with the individual phones in the range seemingly having little in common, ranging from the WinMo X1, the Android X10 outed last week and now this perplexing transparent number.