Tag: Red Phone Boxes

Phone Box Thursday: Durham Green

Dee Leave a comment

This week’s phone box is the first one I found in the North East of England, outside Durham Cathedral.

Red phone box
Red phone box, Durham Green, Durham, 1st May 2015.

(Coordinates 54°77’48.1″N, 1°57’54.3″W.)

When I took this one, I remember Geth going on a big rant about how there was this beautiful medieval cathedral right in front of me and there I was, taking a photo of the phone box.  An older lady who was walking past backed me up, saying ‘they don’t make them like that anymore!’  They most certainly don’t.  Anyway, I did take a photo of the cathedral as well:

Durham Cathedral
With bonus traffic cones.

But frankly, you can see pictures of Durham Cathedral any time you like (given that it has a Wikipedia page and everything), and you can’t say that about the Durham Cathedral phone box.

Update 15th July 2021: it’s now a defibrillator box!

Phone Box Thursday: High Street, Southampton

Dee Leave a comment

I did threaten promise to start posting my collection of red phone box photos, so here I go!

Red phone boxes in Southampton
Red phone boxes, High Street, Southampton, 17th March 2015.

(Coordinates 50°89’66.4″N, 1°40’43.7″W.)

I took this photo on our last night living in Southampton; we moved away the next day.  I do also have one of me, slightly tipsy and posing with the right-hand box like a nutter, but nobody needs to see that.  I never go into phone boxes to examine them more closely (they’re usually pretty gross inside nowadays as people only really use them as urinals/bins) but the phones in these ones are at least still intact, even if they probably don’t work anymore.  When Geth and I finally paid a flying visit to Southampton last May for the first time since moving away, we walked down High Street to visit the Platform Tavern (one of our favourite pubs in the city) and the phone boxes were still standing – good to see!

Update February 2022: added the coordinate link.  It’s good to see that these two were still standing as of September 2020.

Red phone boxes

Dee Leave a comment

In the month of my birth, January 1985, two important things happened in the history of the telephone in the UK.  One was Britain’s first ever mobile phone call, made in the early hours of New Year’s Day 1985.  The other was the announcement that classic red phone boxes would be replaced with a new design.  Looking 33 years backwards from our world of smartphone zombies, YMMV on whether either of these was a good thing.

The classic red phone box is one of my favourite aesthetic icons of 20th century Britain.  I love red phone boxes and take pictures of them wherever I find them, like some kind of excitable tourist.  Sad to say they are gradually becoming rarer and rarer on Britain’s streets, but lots of them are being repurposed for things like defibrillators and cash machines, so I live in hope that they won’t disappear completely.

Red phone box in York
Me with a classic phone box outside York Minster last year. I spotted it while running the Yorkshire 10 Mile race and went back for a photo the next day.

I have lots of phone box pictures and will be sharing them on the blog soon!

Some of my favourite useful links for info about phone boxes:

My forthcoming ’80s house!

Dee Leave a comment

My husband Geth and I are in the process of buying our first house at the moment, which, as with every move, is both exciting and stressful at the same time.  We’re pretty close to completion now, and had a meeting with our solicitor in Whitley Bay today to sign stuff and finalise things.

Whitley Bay red phone box
Gratuitous phone box picture of the phone box near Whitley Bay metro station, probably my favourite phone box in the North East.

I was excited to find out today that the house we’re buying was built in 1988.  I love the ’80s but have never lived in an ’80s build before!  I’m really looking forward to moving in next month, getting settled, and starting to plan all my home improvement projects.