Telephone Kiosk

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A red telephone kiosk type “K6” designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott; installed between 1935-1953. Located adjacent to the former Post Office (HB17/09/022A) in the village of Ballyroney.

Cast-iron body painted red with largely replacement glazing; blank to rear. Front glazed door missing. Each elevation is embossed with the symbolic “Tudor Crown” motif over sign displaying “TELEPHONE”. The interior has been replaced with a modern telephone.

Historical information

The Telephone box outside Ballyroney Post Office (see HB 17/09/022A) does not appear on the historic Ordnance Survey maps or valuation sources as it was erected between 1935 and c.1953. The Telephone box is an example of a Kiosk No. 6, a Telephone Kiosk designed by Giles Gilbert-Scott (1880-1960), an English Architect who is also famous for designing Liverpool Cathedral, Battersea Power Station and the Bankside Power Station (now the Tate Modern Gallery) in London. The first K6 Telephone boxes were commissioned in 1935 in celebration of the Silver Jubilee of King George V (Johansson; Heritage.electra website). The design of the kiosk roofs were based upon the roof of Sir John Soane’s Mausoleum (1753-1837: Architect to the Bank of England), which lies in St. Pancras Old Church in London (White, p. 12).

The precise date that the Telephone Kiosk was installed in Ballyroney is not known however it was certainly prior to 1956 when the last kiosks of this design were installed. From the mid-1950s a modified K6 Telephone Kiosk was reintroduced throughout the United Kingdom in celebration of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

The crown above the entrance to the kiosk confirms that the telephone box at Ballyroney was an original K6. When the K6 was reintroduced in the mid-1950s it had a slot at the top, that was designed to accommodate one of Queen Elizabeth’s two royal crowns; technically Elizabeth II was the first English Queen of Scotland of that name (as Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603) was not Queen of Scotland during her reign). As a result Royal Mail post office cast two royal crowns; King Edward’s crown for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and King James V Crown for Scotland (Johannessen). The crown above the entrance of the Telephone Kiosk in Ballyroney is the Tudor Crown of George V confirming the earlier model.

The Telephone Kiosk was listed in 1990 and in 1997 Royal Mail included the picturesque Victorian shop and kiosk in a commemorative set of four postage stamps which depicted a post office from each of the four regions of the United Kingdom. These stamps were the post office at Haroldswick in the Shetland Islands; Painswick in Gloucestershire; Beddegelert in Gwynedd and the post office in Ballyroney, which was on the 63 pence stamp for Northern Ireland (Young).The Telephone Kiosk in Ballyroney continues to function.

References

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/42/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey map 1919-1920
2. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/24E – Annual Revisions 1912-1929

Secondary Sources

1. Johannessen, N., ‘Telephone boxes’ Princes Risborough: Shire, 1994.
2. White, P., ‘Telephone Kiosks’ English Heritage Conservation Bulletin: London, 1987
3. Young, A. F., ‘Old Rathriland, Hilltown and Ballyroney’ Ayrshire: Stenlake Publishing, 2002.

Online Resources

1. Heritage.electra website - http://heritage.elettra.co.uk/phonebox/k6.html

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

V. Authorship
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

One of few surviving red telephone kiosk type “K6” designed by Giles Gilbert Scott dating between 1935-1953. Although compromised by the loss of its door, its essential character and interest survive. An iconic international design once common, now increasingly rare. It forms a noteworthy group with the adjacent post office and house (HB17/09/022A).