Telephone Booth - Blog Posts

Traditional Basement in New York

Large elegant walk-out basement image with a brown floor and beige walls.

Mojave Phone Booth 196?-2000

In the late 1990s, certain corners of the Internet took notice of a strange anomaly in California’s Mojave desert: a lone phone booth, miles from civilization. The Mojave Phone Booth developed a strong following among telecom enthusiasts, phone phreaks, and other fans of odd cultural artifacts.  People called the booth for days on end hoping to talk to strangers wandering the desert, and pilgrimages to the booth itself became increasingly common.

The National Park Service, bothered by the effect of growing numbers of visiting telephone fans, eventually had the booth removed.  Its legacy lives on, with the booth and its story inspiring literature, film, and music as well as the continuing exchange of fond memories.

Acrylic on canvas, 7x5″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

K8 Red Telephone Box 1968

The noble Red Telephone Box is a British institution, inspiring warm thoughts and a distinctively British style across the generations.  The K8 marked the final generation of the classic red booth before the range was retired.

Bringing the classic phone box style into the modern era, the K8 took a turn for the minimalist; multi-pane windows, hard right angles, and wooden doors of the past gave way to single large glass panes, rounded corners, and aluminium doors of the future.  While the silhouette still evoked the distinguished red boxes of old, the updated details brought the range to a close with a thoroughly 1960s flair.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

K2 Red Telephone Box 1926

The noble Red Telephone Box is a British institution, inspiring warm thoughts and a distinctively British style across the generations.   Britain's very first red booth design was the cast-iron K2, which very quickly became ubiquitous throughout London and the surrounding areas throughout the 1920s and 1930s.

Britain’s Red Telephone Boxes continued to take inspiration from the K2 throughout the entire payphone era, and copies and tributes to the design can still be found in phone booths around the world today.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.