Red telephone box - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The red telephone box, a public telephone kiosk

Telephone booth

A telephone booth, telephone kiosk, telephone call box or telephone box is a small structure furnished with a payphone and designed for a telephone user's convenience. In the USA, Canada and Australia, "telephone booth" is used, while in the UK and the rest of the Commonwealth it is a "telephone...

Giles Gilbert Scott

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, OM, FRIBA was an English architect known for his work on such buildings as Liverpool Cathedral and Battersea Power Station and designing the iconic red telephone box....

, is a familiar sight on the streets of the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, Malta

Malta

Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

, Bermuda

Bermuda

Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...

and Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...

, and despite a reduction in their numbers in recent years, red boxes can still be seen in many places and in current or former British colonies around the world. The colour red was chosen to make them easy to spot.

Design history

The first standard public telephone

Telephone

The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

kiosk introduced by the United Kingdom Post Office

General Post Office

General Post Office is the name of the British postal system from 1660 until 1969.General Post Office may also refer to:* General Post Office, Perth* General Post Office, Sydney* General Post Office, Melbourne* General Post Office, Brisbane...

was produced in concrete in 1920 and was designated K1 (Kiosk No.1). This design was not of the same family as the familiar red telephone boxes. Very few remarkable examples remain. One shining example is located in Trinity market in Kingston-upon-Hull where it is still in use today.

The red telephone box was the result of a competition in 1924 to design a kiosk that would be acceptable to the London Metropolitan Boroughs which had hitherto resisted the Post Office's effort to erect K1 kiosks on their streets.

The Royal Fine Art Commission was instrumental in the choice of the British standard kiosk. Because of widespread dissatisfaction with the GPO's design, the Metropolitan Boroughs Joint Standing Committee organised a competition for a superior one in 1923, but the results were disappointing. The Birmingham Civic Society

The Birmingham Civic Society

The Birmingham Civic Society was founded at an inaugural meeting on 10 June 1918 in The Council House, Birmingham, England and is registered with The Civic Trust. The first President of the Society, the Earl of Plymouth, addressed the assembled Aldermen, Councillors, Architects and other city...

then produced a design of its own — in reinforced concrete — but it was informed by the Director of Telephones that the design produced by the Office of the Engineer-in-Chief was preferred; as the Architects’ Journal commented, 'no one with any knowledge of design could feel anything but indignation with the pattern that seems to satisfy the official mind.' The Birmingham Civic Society

The Birmingham Civic Society

did not give up and, with additional pressure from the Royal Institute of British Architects

Royal Institute of British Architects

The Royal Institute of British Architects is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally.-History:...

, the Town Planning Institute and the Royal Academy

Royal Academy

The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...

, the Postmaster General

United Kingdom Postmaster General

The Postmaster General of the United Kingdom is a defunct Cabinet-level ministerial position in HM Government. Aside from maintaining the postal system, the Telegraph Act of 1868 established the Postmaster General's right to exclusively maintain electric telegraphs...

was forced to think again; and the result was that the RFAC organised a limited competition.

The organisers invited entries from three respected architects and, along with the designs from the Post Office and from The Birmingham Civic Society

The Birmingham Civic Society

, the Fine Arts Commission judged the competition and selected the design submitted by Giles Gilbert Scott. The invitation had come at the time when Scott had been made a trustee of Sir John Soane's Museum — his design for the competition was in the classical style, but topped with a dome reminiscent of Soane's self-designed mausoleums in St Pancras' Old Churchyard

St Pancras Old Church

St Pancras Old Church is a Church of England parish church in central London. It is believed to be one of the oldest sites of Christian worship in England, and is dedicated to the Roman martyr Saint Pancras, although the building itself is largely Victorian...

and Dulwich Picture Gallery

Dulwich Picture Gallery

Dulwich Picture Gallery is an art gallery in Dulwich, South London. England's first purpose-built public art gallery, it was designed by Regency architect Sir John Soane and opened to the public in 1817. Soane arranged the exhibition spaces as a series of interlinked rooms illuminated naturally...

, London. (The original wooden prototypes of the entries were later put into public service at under-cover sites around London. That of Scott's design is the only one known to survive and is still where it was placed all those years ago, in the entrance arch to the Royal Academy

Royal Academy

.)

The Post Office chose to make Scott's winning design in cast iron

Cast iron

Cast iron is derived from pig iron, and while it usually refers to gray iron, it also identifies a large group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic. The color of a fractured surface can be used to identify an alloy. White cast iron is named after its white surface when fractured, due...

(Scott had suggested mild steel

Plain-carbon steel

Carbon steel, also called plain-carbon steel, is steel where the main interstitial alloying constituent is carbon. The American Iron and Steel Institute defines carbon steel as: "Steel is considered to be carbon steel when no minimum content is specified or required for chromium, cobalt,...

) and to paint it red (Scott had suggested silver, with a "greeny-blue" interior) and, with other minor changes of detail, it was brought into service as the Kiosk No.2 or K2. From 1926 K2 was deployed in and around London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

and the K1 continued to be erected elsewhere.

K3, introduced in 1929, again by Gilbert Scott was similar to K2 but was constructed from concrete and intended for nationwide use. Cheaper than the K2, it was still significantly more costly than the K1 and so that remained the choice for low-revenue sites. The standard colour scheme for both the K1 and the K3 was cream, with red glazing bars. A rare surviving K3 kiosk can be seen beside in the Penguin Beach exhibit at ZSL London Zoo

London Zoo

London Zoo is the world's oldest scientific zoo. It was opened in London on 27 April 1828, and was originally intended to be used as a collection for scientific study. It was eventually opened to the public in 1847...

, where it has been protected from the weather by the projecting eaves and recently restored to its original colour scheme,

K4 (designed by the Post Office Engineering Department in 1927) incorporated a post box and machines for buying postage stamp

Postage stamp

A postage stamp is a small piece of paper that is purchased and displayed on an item of mail as evidence of payment of postage. Typically, stamps are made from special paper, with a national designation and denomination on the face, and a gum adhesive on the reverse side...

s on the exterior. Only 50 kiosks of this design were built.

K5 was a plywood construction introduced in 1934 and designed to be assembled and dismantled and used at exhibitions.

K6

In 1935 the K6 (kiosk number six) was designed to commemorate the silver jubilee

Silver Jubilee

A Silver Jubilee is a celebration held to mark a 25th anniversary. The anniversary celebrations can be of a wedding anniversary, ruling anniversary or anything that has completed a 25 year mark...

of King George V

George V of the United Kingdom

George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 through the First World War until his death in 1936....

. K6 was the first red telephone kiosk to be used extensively outside of London, and many thousands were deployed in virtually every town and city, replacing most of the existing kiosks and establishing thousands of new sites. It has become a British icon, although it was not universally loved at the start. The red colour caused particular local difficulties and there were many requests for less visible colours. The red that is now much loved was then anything but, and the Post Office was forced into allowing a less strident grey with red glazing bars scheme for areas of natural and architectural beauty. Ironically, some of these areas that have preserved their telephone boxes have now painted them red.

Kiosk installation: the early years

With continued demand for K6 kiosks, siting them was more widespread than ever before. A purpose built kiosk trailer was designed from 1953 to reduce the running costs of cranes.http://www.redtelephonebox.com/images/photos/trailer/pages/trailer009_jpg.htm

Number of red telephone boxes

The K6 was the most prolific kiosk in the UK and its growth, from 1935, can be seen from the BT archives:

1925 - 1,000 (K1 Only)
1930 - 8,000 (K2 & K3 added)
1935 - 19,000 (K6 introduced)
1940 - 35,000
1950 - 44,000
1960 - 65,000
1970 - 70,000 (K8 introduced in 1968)
1980 - 73,000

Crown

In 1952 the new Queen, Elizabeth II

Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...

, decided to depart from the practice of using the purely symbolic 'Tudor Crown' as the symbol of her government, and instead use a representation of the actual crown generally used for British coronations, the St Edward's Crown. This new symbol therefore began to appear on the fascias of K6 kiosks. In Scotland, the Post Office opted to use a representation of the actual Crown of Scotland

Crown of Scotland

The Crown of Scotland is the crown used at the coronation of the monarchs of Scotland. Remade in its current form for King James V of Scotland in 1540, the crown is part of the Honours of Scotland, the oldest set of Crown Jewels in the United Kingdom...

, in line with the new practice for other parts of the Government.

Prior to these changes, the Tudor Crown had been used in all parts of the United Kingdom, and the British Empire

British Empire

The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...

.

To accommodate the two different Crowns on the K6 kiosks, the fascia sections were henceforth cast with a slot in them, into which a plate bearing the appropriate crown was inserted before the roof section was fitted. (This change happened in 1955 and is a very useful way of dating K6 boxes manufactured thereafter.)

Kiosks installed in Kingston upon Hull

Kingston upon Hull

Kingston upon Hull , usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It stands on the River Hull at its junction with the Humber estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea. Hull has a resident population of...

were not fitted with a crown, as those kiosks were installed by the Hull Corporation (later Hull City Council

Hull City Council

Hull City Council is the governing body for the unitary authority and city of Kingston upon Hull. It was created in 1972 as the successor to the Corporation of Hull, which was also known as Hull Corporation....

, then Kingston Communications

Kingston Communications

KCOM Group , formerly known as Kingston Communications, is a UK communications and IT services provider. Its headquarters is in Kingston upon Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, where subsidiary business unit KC serves local residents and businesses with Internet and telephony services...

). All boxes in Hull were also painted in cream.

Modernisation

In 1959 architect Neville Conder was commissioned to design a new box. The K7 design went no further than the prototype stage. K8 was introduced in 1968 designed by Bruce Martin. It was used primarily for new sites; around 11000 were installed, replacing earlier models only when they needed relocating or had been damaged beyond repair. The K8 retained a red colour scheme, but it was a different shade of red: a slightly brighter 'Poppy Red', which went on to be the standard colour across all kiosks.

Only 12 remain — most having been replaced with the KX100 — making the K8 as rare as the K3.

Privatisation

Upon the privatisation

Privatization

Privatization is the incidence or process of transferring ownership of a business, enterprise, agency or public service from the public sector to the private sector or to private non-profit organizations...

of Post Office Telephone's successor, British Telecom (BT), the KX100, a more utilitarian design, began to replace most of the existing boxes. Some 2000 boxes were given listed status and several thousand others were left on low-revenue mostly rural sites but many thousands of recovered K2 and K6 boxes were sold off. Some kiosks have been converted to be used as shower cubicles in private homes. In Kingston upon Thames

Kingston upon Thames

Kingston upon Thames is the principal settlement of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames in southwest London. It was the ancient market town where Saxon kings were crowned and is now a suburb situated south west of Charing Cross. It is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the...

a number of old K6 boxes have been utilised to form a work of art resembling a row of fallen dominoes

Dominoes

Dominoes generally refers to the collective gaming pieces making up a domino set or to the subcategory of tile games played with domino pieces. In the area of mathematical tilings and polyominoes, the word domino often refers to any rectangle formed from joining two congruent squares edge to edge...

. The KX100 PLUS, introduced in 1996 featured a domed roof reminiscent of the familiar K2 and K6. Subsequent designs have departed significantly from the old style red telephone boxes.

During 2009 a K6 in the village of Westbury-sub-Mendip

Westbury-sub-Mendip

Westbury-sub-Mendip is a village in Somerset, England, with a population of about 800, situated on the southern slopes of the Mendip Hills from Wells and Cheddar.The parish boundary is formed by the River Axe-History:...

in Somerset

Somerset

The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...

was converted into a library or book exchange replacing the services of the mobile library which no longer visits the village.

In 2010, in the village of Brookwood, Surrey

Brookwood, Surrey

Brookwood is a village in Surrey, located about 5 km west of Woking, in a semi-rural location. It lies on the western border of the Woking Borough ....

a project was initiated to restore and preserve the sole remaining K6 kiosk in the village. The kiosk had been adopted by Woking Borough Council in 2009 and a group of residents set about restoring the kiosk. This was achieved through private donations and sponsorship from local businesses. A blog detailed the restoration.

Red telephone boxes elsewhere

Several of these distinctive telephone boxes have been installed on the Norman, Oklahoma

Oklahoma

Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...

, campus of the University of Oklahoma

University of Oklahoma

The University of Oklahoma is a coeducational public research university located in Norman, Oklahoma. Founded in 1890, it existed in Oklahoma Territory near Indian Territory for 17 years before the two became the state of Oklahoma. the university had 29,931 students enrolled, most located at its...

, where they continue to serve their originally intended function. Elsewhere in the United States, a few have also been installed in downtown Glenview, Illinois

Glenview, Cook County, Illinois

Glenview is a suburban village located approximately north of downtown Chicago in Cook County, Illinois. As of the 2000 census, the village population was 41,847...

. There is also one outside the British Embassy in Washington, D.C. A red telephone box can also be found on the Courthouse Square in Oxford, Mississippi

Oxford, Mississippi

Oxford is a city in, and the county seat of, Lafayette County, Mississippi, United States. Founded in 1835, it was named after the British university city of Oxford in hopes of having the state university located there, which it did successfully attract....

. There is one on the square in Collierville, Tennessee. In Massachusetts, there is also a red telephone box in the student centre of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

. In addition, there is a red telephone box outside the town building (town hall/police station/post office) in the tiny mountain town of Rowe, Massachusetts

Rowe, Massachusetts

Rowe is a town in Franklin County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 351 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area.-History:...

, which is an original installation dating back to when the town of Rowe first got telephone service. Two red telephone boxes are on display at the World Showcase area of Disney's EPCOT

Epcot

Epcot is a theme park in the Walt Disney World Resort, located near Orlando, Florida. The park is dedicated to the celebration of human achievement, namely international culture and technological innovation. The second park built at the resort, it opened on October 1, 1982 and was initially named...

in Orlando, Florida

Orlando, Florida

Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States...

, One located in the United Kingdom area and one in the Canada area. An original K6 can also be found outside of the Allied Building in Treasure Island, Florida. There are also a few red boxes at the Ellenton Outlet Mall, just off I-75, near Bradenton, Florida. These still have their original STD code cards in place and have working US payphone equipment. There is a Red Pillar box in Westminster Maryland on the corner of West Main Street and Rt. 27 out side of Johanson's Dining House.

British K6 phone boxes are to be found, painted green, in the centre of Kinsale

Kinsale

Kinsale is a town in County Cork, Ireland. Located some 25 km south of Cork City on the coast near the Old Head of Kinsale, it sits at the mouth of the River Bandon and has a population of 2,257 which increases substantially during the summer months when the tourist season is at its peak and...

, an old historic town in County Cork

County Cork

County Cork is a county in Ireland. It is located in the South-West Region and is also part of the province of Munster. It is named after the city of Cork . Cork County Council is the local authority for the county...

within the Republic of Ireland

Republic of Ireland

Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...

.

Red telephone boxes are also found across Malta

Malta

, Gozo

Gozo

Gozo is a small island of the Maltese archipelago in the Mediterranean Sea. The island is part of the Southern European country of Malta; after the island of Malta itself, it is the second-largest island in the archipelago...

,parts of the Caribbean such as Antigua

Antigua

Antigua , also known as Waladli, is an island in the West Indies, in the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean region, the main island of the country of Antigua and Barbuda. Antigua means "ancient" in Spanish and was named by Christopher Columbus after an icon in Seville Cathedral, Santa Maria de la...

, Barbados

Barbados

Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...

, as well as in Cyprus

Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...

, showing that the colonial influence is still present. Some of telephone booths are being used as internet kiosks.

Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

and New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

each had their own design of red telephone box, and some examples have been preserved in sensitive or historic sites. A brief and colourful campaign was run to "save" the red telephone box in New Zealand by the Wizard of New Zealand.

Telephone booths in Norway

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

were also coloured red, and built to a standard design by architect Georg Fredrik Fasting from 1932.

In 2008 ten K6 telephone boxes were imported from the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

to the Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i city of Petah Tikva

Petah Tikva

Petah Tikva known as Em HaMoshavot , is a city in the Center District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv.According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, at the end of 2009, the city's population stood at 209,600. The population density is approximately...

and installed on its main street, Haim Ozer.

Kingston upon Hull

was the only area of the UK not under the Post Office monopoly, with telephones being under the control of the Corporation of Hull (city council). In Hull and the surrounding area this meant that the telephone boxes were painted cream and had the crown omitted. The Hull telephone system was subsequently privatised and is now operated by Kingston Communications

Kingston Communications

. Kingston Communications (KC) have removed many of the famous cream K6 boxes circa 2007. An outraged public complained that they were losing part of their heritage, thanks due to media involvement. KC have retained approx 125 K6's that remain in use today. KC used the media frenzy to its advantage and allocated limited numbers (approx. 1000) to be sold to the general public, and many were sold off before they had even been removed from service.

Crown dependencies

The telephone services of the Crown dependencies were split at various times from the GPO.

Guernsey

Guernsey Telecoms painted its kiosks yellow with white window frames, they were repainted in blue when the company was sold to Cable and Wireless in 2002.

Isle of Man

Manx Telecom

Manx Telecom is the primary provider of broadband and telecommunications on the Isle of Man. It was acquired by Telefónica in , but was sold to two private equity groups in 2010.- History :...

has left its kiosks in the red colour used by its predecessors British Telecom and the GPO. A green telephone box exists in Cregneash

Cregneash

Cregneash or Cregneish is a remote village situated on Mull Hill in the south of the Isle of Man.Annual Manx festivals are held in Cregneash and it is home to a flock of the rare four-horned Loaghtan sheep. Much of the village forms a "Living Museum" dedicated to the preservation of the...

, at the south of the island (there is another at Gilwell Park, near Chingford, Essex).

Replica telephone boxes

Lightweight replica K6 telephone kiosks are manufactured as flat-packs by commercial vendors and are shipped around the world for installation in such places as bars, restaurants and offices.

External links

Inside a Red telephone box - Interactive 360 degree Panorama
Panorama
A panorama is any wide-angle view or representation of a physical space, whether in painting, drawing, photography, film/video, or a three-dimensional model....

from London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.
PayPhoneBox Index of British Red Phone Boxes.
More K6 facts
Illustrated history of the Telephone Box
Red telephone kiosks in Oxford, England
Red phone boxes in the Welsh landscape
Existing red phone boxes around the city of Liverpool
Where I Live: Are there any K8's out there? (BBC)

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Design history

K6

Kiosk installation: the early years

Number of red telephone boxes

Crown

Modernisation

Privatisation

Red telephone boxes elsewhere

Kingston upon Hull

Crown dependencies

Guernsey

Isle of Man

Replica telephone boxes

See also

External links