• Telephone box has been outside the Royal Academy in London since 1924
• Box was built as part of a competition to create the iconic design

Heritage Minister Helen Whately has announced that the prototype for the UK’s first red public telephone box has been upgraded to Grade II* in recognition of its iconic design status.

Created in 1924 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (1880 – 1960), the prototype K2 (Kiosk No.2) telephone box formed the basis of the design of future telephone boxes across the country.

The timber K2 prototype was designed for a competition launched by the Royal Fine Arts Commission at the request of the Postmaster General to find an alternate to the unpopular concrete K1 structure which had been introduced in 1921.

Scott’s timber prototype was initially displayed in 1924 outside the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square with four other designs, and in 1925 it was announced that the K2 telephone box was the one ‘most suitable for erection in busy thoroughfares of large towns’.

Scott’s winning design was originally intended to be made of steel and painted silver with a blue-green interior, however, upon selection of the K2 design, the General Post Office chose to make it of cast-iron and painted red.