The red telephone box

Now, I’m going to talk about the red telephone box, one of the most interesting icons of UK. I choose this icon because is one of the symbols or icons more recognized in the world, we can see it in films, series, photos and all of us want to make us a photo with it.

However this red telephone box has a long history until now. The development of the telephone was in 1876 but the history of this public telephone does not begin until 1900 when the General Post Office was formed and the phone boxes began to increase in towns and cities. In the streets there were a lot of designs but the first public telephone appeared in 1921 and was called K1. Unfortunately the look of the K1 wasn't popular with the general public and in 1926 appeared the called K2, designed by Sir Giles Gilbert, but was very expensive and big to produce it.

Since then, there were a lot of designs and modification, before the definitive public telephone appeared in 1935, when the General Post Office asked to Sir Giles to create a new model and Sir Giles accepted creating the K6 red telephone box. It was perfect, had the good things of K1 and K3 and the solidness of the K2 with the elegance and small sizes that the GPO Company wanted.

It’s said that, although the first public telephone appeared in 1921, in 1926 the Royal Fine Arts Commission asked to Sir Giles a new design and since then the public telephones began to be red and created with cast iron. However, when the queen Elizabeth II ascended to the throne in 1952 ordered that all the red telephone box of UK had the St. Edward’s Crown.