Happy New Year!
As we say goodbye to 2016 and welcome in 2017, a sneak peek into my personal collection. Or- the bit of my personal collection I am keeping.
I became interested in resin, and experimented with making jewellery and door pulls. This in turn led me to research and learn about plastics- and during this research I became interested in bakelite. You know the rest of the story: I now collect bakelite.
This is an old bakelite phone from the 30s- made in Australia- bought recently. It needs restoration, and I have Greygate No.5 Polishing Paste on hand to do it. This polishing paste was developed to restore bakelite on phones for the GPO in the 50s – and it’s still made today. Bakelite itself is still in production- in the manufacture of light switches and electrical components, so the restoring paste is also still made.
The phone can also be restored electronically – if one wished to use it as a landline. And- it has a little drawer for phone numbers in the front – a wonderful design, if somewhat whimsical.
Happy New Year to all re:retro readers & followers! And here’s to much retro in the future!
Brings back memories. As a child my parents had one of those phones in bakelite. Where yours has the curly plastic wire connecting the handset, theirs was the fabric type cord. It also had a chrome button on top which I believe was originally for a party line, where two numbers shared the same line. Eventually it was replaced as BT couldn’t repair it any more ☺
thanks for your memory- those are interesting details about bakelite phones.
Oh and Happy New Year by the way. You always bring back so many memories from my childhood.
thanks! and – happy new year to you!
What a beautiful telephone! I must get some of that polishing paste. ❤️
thanks mallory! i had to import the paste from england- couldn’t find it in australia.
Wow! I’m sure that it would be well worth it.