Cannot access properties of subclass - objective-c

Question

I have created the following subclass to do some custom drawing:
// DocumentIconView.h
#interface DocumentIconView : UIView
{
UIImageView *documentIconView;
CloseHandle *closeHandle;
UILabel *filenameLabel;
}
#property (nonatomic, strong) UIImageView *documentIconView;
#property (nonatomic, strong) CloseHandle *closeHandle;
#property (nonatomic, strong) UILabel *filenameLabel;
+ (DocumentIconView *)documentIconWithFrame:(CGRect)viewFrame
previewImage:(UIImage *)previewImage
title:(NSString *)title;
This works well for the most part (I can instantiate objects, and do custom drawing), however, I cannot access some of its properties from another classes.
DocumentIconView *iconView = [DocumentIconView documentIconWithFrame:frame
previewImage:[UIImage imageNamed:#"GenericDocumentIcon.png"]
title:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"test"]];
iconView.backgroundColor = [UIColor lightGrayColor]; // this works
iconView.filenameLabel.backgroundColor = [UIColor darkGrayColor]; // this does not work - no error message
[documentsView addSubview:iconView];
I can read and write first-level properties, but cannot drill deeper; when trying to read properties, the value returned is (null)
I am fairly new at subclassing, so I think I am missing something really obvious here. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
EDIT: the method for instantiating the view in question:
+ (DocumentIconView *)documentIconWithFrame:(CGRect)viewFrame
previewImage:(UIImage *)previewImage
title:(NSString *)title
{
DocumentIconView *view = [[DocumentIconView alloc] initWithFrame:viewFrame];
// Close handle's size is assigned here
CGSize closeHandleSize = CGSizeMake(27, 27);
// The document preview image's frame is calculated by shrinking it by the close handle's size
CGRect documentPreviewFrame = CGRectMake(closeHandleSize.width / 2,
closeHandleSize.height / 2,
viewFrame.size.width - closeHandleSize.width,
viewFrame.size.height - closeHandleSize.height - 20); // 20 points is the filenameLabel's height
UIImageView *documentPreviewView = [[UIImageView alloc] initWithFrame:documentPreviewFrame];
documentPreviewView.contentMode = UIViewContentModeScaleAspectFit;
documentPreviewView.backgroundColor = [UIColor clearColor];
documentPreviewView.image = previewImage;
[view addSubview:documentPreviewView];
CGRect closeHandleFrame = CGRectMake(0, 0, closeHandleSize.width, closeHandleSize.height);
CloseHandle *closeHandleView = [[CloseHandle alloc] initWithFrame:closeHandleFrame];
closeHandleView.alpha = 0.0;
closeHandleView.tag = kCloseHandleTag;
[view addSubview:closeHandleView];
CGRect filenameFrame = CGRectMake(0,
viewFrame.size.height - 20,
viewFrame.size.width,
20);
UILabel *filenameLabel = [[UILabel alloc] initWithFrame:filenameFrame];
filenameLabel.backgroundColor = [UIColor clearColor];
filenameLabel.text = title;
filenameLabel.font = [UIFont boldSystemFontOfSize:17];
filenameLabel.textColor = [UIColor whiteColor];
filenameLabel.textAlignment = UITextAlignmentCenter;
[view addSubview:filenameLabel];
view.tag = kDocumentIconTag;
return view;
}

Answer 1

In your documentIconWithFrame:... method you're using a local variable (filenameLabel) that you're adding to the view. That means your instance variable is never instantiated and is always nil.
Just change this:
UILabel *filenameLabel = [[UILabel alloc] initWithFrame:filenameFrame];
to this:
filenameLabel = [[UILabel alloc] initWithFrame:filenameFrame];
and the same for the other instance variables.