Anton Kudin, a Russian graphic designer living in Krasnodar who specializes in user interface and web design, posted an iPhone interface concept called “fold to unlock iOS style” on the image sharing site dribbble (think Instagram for graphic designers).

Anton Kudin's fold to unlock concept

In the fold to unlock concept, instead of sliding a bar across the iPhone’s lock screen, the user pushes the lock screen away. The screen folds up like a map. Though Kudin presented the most aesthetically pleasing example of an accordian-style lock screen that I’ve seen so far, it’s actually one example in a recent line of mutations of UI designer Guillame Gaubert’s Unlock Concept (which only features one fold and a different lock screen design).

Guillaume Gaubert's earlier folding unlock concept

Although Kudin didn’t pioneer the concept, I really like the multiple folds in his renderings, as well as the subtle drop shadow underneath which gives the folded lockscreen a powerful illusion of depth. While this is only a concept, and will likely never see an official release from Apple, I would be willing to do terrible, unforgivable things to make this concept a reality on Cydia (or I’d be willing to play $2.99, whichever comes first).

We really need to get Kudin talking with someone like Chpwn (the developer behind Zephyr, which includes a number of interesting UI tweaks).

Is Fold To Unlock a concept you’d be willing to use? Or do you think it’s a showy and pointless waste of the iPhone’s resources (battery, GPU rendering, etc)? Will it bring back the MAD Magazine fold-in? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.