Grovemade Review: Hands-On With the Leather & Maple iPhone 6 Plus Case and Dock

[MacRumors]

Portland-based company Grovemade is known for its range of attractive wood accessories designed for the iPad and the iPhone, which it has been producing for several years now. Grovemade recently invited MacRumors to go hands-on with two of its newest products for the iPhone 6 Plus, and we jumped at the chance because Grovemade products have been popular with our readers in the past.

We checked out the Maple and Leather iPhone Case and the matching Maple iPhone Dock. Read on to see what we thought.

Maple & Leather iPhone Case

All of Grovemade's products are crafted by hand and the company's attention to detail is evident in both the dock and the Maple & Leather iPhone Case. The base of the iPhone case is made of maple (there's also an option for a darker walnut) that's been carved to fit the iPhone 6 Plus.

Design
The phone fits tightly into the maple shell, which has a cutouts for the camera, the mute switch, the headphone port, the speakers, and the Lightning port. There are darker wooden buttons for the volume and the power, which are lined with foam on the inside to activate the volume and power on the iPhone.

At the points where different wood pieces have been joined to create the case, there's darker wood burned accents, which is aesthetically pleasing, and there's also some wood burning around each of the ports, for a darker look. A piece of leather wraps around the backside of the shell and covers the front of the phone, and the leather front cover is attached to another thin piece of maple that protects the iPhone's display.

On the maple attached to the cover, there are three pieces of metal, which adhere to three magnets built into the wooden shell. Inside the case, there are two additional magnets that pop away to allow the leather cover pull back to serve as a stand for the iPhone when in landscape mode. There are three separate stand positions that give slightly different viewing angles, and because of the cover, the phone also stands up by itself in portrait mode.


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Article Link: Grovemade Review: Hands-On With the Leather & Maple iPhone 6 Plus Case and Dock

 

[patrickcwelsh]

All of my questions were answered in the "cons" section. Didn't even need to read the article. No, thank you.

 

[Zxxv]

Looks clunky.

Dock and case don't work together?

who designed this... monkeys?

 

[Kissaragi]

I have never seen a wooden phone that looks good, it just seems like a terrible material for cases to me. Obviously a market for them however.

The dock looks ok but if im going to have a wooden dock id rather it had nicer grain than maple.

 

[Harmonious Zen]

I have never seen a wooden phone that looks good

I've never seen a wooden phone, period! I kid, I kid.

There are definitely people out there who like the feel and look of wood. I just personally don't think a sleek high tech device like an iPhone mixes well with wood. But that's just me.

 

[samh004]

What company makes two products that should work together, yet advertises one of them (dock) as not just not working with the other product (case), but only working with competitors products? Sounds badly thought out.

 

[thegrants82]

that looks terrible.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Dock and case don't work together?

who designed this... monkeys?

No....

Portland-based company...

Hipsters...

 

[epheterson]

How is there not a picture of it in the case, in the dock?

 

[samh004]

How is there not a picture of it in the case, in the dock?

Presumably there's no picture because it would simply fall over...

 

[x5tuu]

I never post to things like this, but cant resist here.

I don't 'get' it ... Ok people may like to combine a natural material into a case, but the design is quite poor and this seems to be countered with the burnt edges (as if that removes/hides bad design) ... the rounded edges on one side, the squared on the opposite, it looks like it was designed and created as a school project

I do like the dock, but don't see the need for the wood housing that slips over either, if youre going to be eco-friendly, make it out of a complete block of wood or a layered block to create texture etc...

Cant see these selling well IMHO

 

[Roller]

"Wood Jerry, wood!" -Cosmo Kramer, Seinfeld

Wonder how these would handle an overheating iPhone.

 

[Gizmotoy]

I've looked at Grovemade's dock a couple times and been tempted, but never went through with an order. It's strange the review lacks any pictures at all of the cable-retaining portion the review complains about. It seems like that would have been high on the list of things to document.

 

[SuperCachetes]

Ever since the first of these product reviews I read on this site, I've found it odd that the "Pros" and "Cons" are both beside red-colored bullet points. Red is often associated with "STOP" or negativity in general, so it seems like making the "Pros" have green bullet points would be a little more intuitive. Meh... Just a suggestion.

 

[jclo]

I've looked at Grovemade's dock a couple times and been tempted, but never went through with an order. It's strange the review lacks any pictures at all of the cable-retaining portion the review complains about. It seems like that would have been high on the list of things to document.

There's a picture of it, it's the one with the wooden cover off. There's actually not a lot more to see other than that, but I can upload more pictures if you're interested in buying one and want to see how it works in more detail.

The cable feeds up under the steel base and is held in place with the plastic two-pronged key (the black thing in the photo) that slides into the base. Sometimes when you put the phone on the dock it can push the Lightning cable down between the prongs of the key slightly, and that's what requires some adjustment occasionally.

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Ever since the first of these product reviews I read on this site, I've found it odd that the "Pros" and "Cons" are both beside red-colored bullet points. Red is often associated with "STOP" or negativity in general, so it seems like making the "Pros" have green bullet points would be a little more intuitive. Meh... Just a suggestion.

The bullet points are dark red to match the site design, not to convey positivity or negativity.

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How is there not a picture of it in the case, in the dock?

It doesn't fit in the dock in the case, so that's why there's no picture of it that way. The dock and the case aren't meant to work together.

 

[SuperCachetes]

The bullet points are dark red to match the site design, not to convey positivity or negativity.

Oh. Well, as long as there's a reason behind it.

 

[mrmiagi]

They fall apart fairly quickly

I have purchased two wood Grove iPhone cases (one for me, one for the girlfriend) for previous model iPhones. The cases were absolutely beautiful at first and I paid extra to have a very nice design on the back of both cases. Even though both iPhones were handled gently and never dropped, the Grove cases started to fall apart.

It was a crack here, a crack there that started to develop. Then chunks of the cases begin to fall off. Attempts to keep the cases from falling apart were futile. Both cases began to disintegrate at the same time: about 6 months after purchase. Before we knew it, our beautiful grove cases were unusable.

I made attempts to contact the company just to talk about the situation, not to get a free replacement case. They apparently were not interested in talking after not answering two attempts to make contact via email. I just let it go and have not thought about it until I saw this article. I believe I posted my experience on another article but that was quite a while ago.

Buyer beware. These Grove cases are absolutely beautiful. However, they are expensive and they WILL fall apart on you. How long it takes your particular case, who knows, but it will. Not a good investment short term or long term.

I am just passing along my particular experience. I will attempt to locate the pictures I took of the disintegrated cases of which I had sent to Grove in my two emails to them. If anyone here says my story is bogus, it will motivate me more to comb through tens of thousands of pictures in previous years iPhoto library to find the pictures. I prefer you take my word for it and save me the trouble.

The young folks at Grove seem to be a nice group of entrepreneurs and I wanted to support them and I still wish them the best of luck, but the product is flawed and something needed to be said.

Edit: Oh, I thought of one more thing! I bought a Grove wooden case for my iPad 2 around the same time. It had the optional and more expensive leather glass cover. Whenever I was on an airline (I airline a lot!), the leather cover would warp about 1-2 inches on each side. I think it was because of the low humidity in the plane. Anyways, it was annoying and it interfered with the auto lock feature so that my iPad would stay lit. I took some pictures of that too. Oh yeah, the case itself eventually cracked and disintegrated on me just like the iPhone cases did. First a crack, then small pieces, then bigger pieces, then the trash can. I must find those pictures! I will look for those. Ouch, Grove failed 3 out of 3 times. Not a very good batting average!

 

[aakers]

Just received iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 plus wood bumpers in the mail today. Both showed up broken on the corners. Now I didn't buy these thinking they would do too much in terms of stopping my screen from cracking if dropped. These are definitely for people who are going for looks over functionality. Very upset that I couldn't use either of these. Will not use them again. Great looking website and marketing, awful product.

 

[Bjohn01]

DROPS NOT COVERED!

I should have read the fine print before purchasing. I've had my Grovemade leather iPhone 6 case for about a week. The look & feel are great. But one drop from waist height and the corner of the case smashed and splintered! And I expected a bit more durability for the price.

Be warned, Grovemade warranty does not cover drops!

 

[BillAnon]

Expensive junk. Case doesn't fit the iphone 7 plus: the lightning connector won't fit through the case, and Grovemade won't refund the full amount because the cheap leather back piece is a "single use" adhesive pad, but is more than half the purchase price! Stay away form this outfit: toxic.