Leather Covered Telephones

[McHeath]

Wow these are some unique phones.  I too recall a trend to cover everything in leather in the 70's and 80's, and of course who can forget Ricardo Montalban and how much he liked the "Corinthian Leather" in his Chrysler Cordoba?

Did Western Electric ever get into this fad with the old faithfuls, the 500, 554, 2500, Princess and Trimline?

[Phonesrfun]

Did Western Electric ever get into this fad with the old faithfuls, the 500, 554, 2500, Princess and Trimline?

No, the "standard" phones held to their standards.  The Bell System came out with the Design Line in the '70's and they may have had a leather version, but I really don't know.  They also had some other theme type phones such as european inspired phones and candlesticks and other things that were not made by Western Electric.

[paul-f]

The Elite was announced with leather, but they were fairly quickly converted to vinyl as the MBAs got into the act.
 http://www.paul-f.com/weDesignLine.html#Elite
 
Some models started out as leather-like vinyl:
 http://www.paul-f.com/weDesignLine.html#Chest
 http://www.paul-f.com/weDesignLine.html#Exeter

The Design Line page is linked in my signature and here:
 http://www.paul-f.com/weDesignLine.html

[dsk]

Elektrisk bureau of Norway had theese:

made in the eighties.

dsk

[gpo706]

I'd seen a trimphone with its bondage gear on but none of the rest.The first one is quite pretty, looks like a wee Gladstone bag.

Wouldn't these get a bit sweaty, like talking into a brogue?

In fact how about an brown Oxford brogue with a dial in it?

[paul-f]

<snip> ...who can forget Ricardo Montalban and how much he liked the "Corinthian Leather" in his Chrysler Cordoba?

One would think ITT with a factory in Corinth, MS would have had a Corinthian Leather phone.  The closest I've found so far is the Corinthian keyset.  The housing is textured to look sort of like leather, but it's not too convincing.  In fact, it doesn't even look like vinyl faux-leather.
  http://www.paul-f.com/K1231.html

I believe I have a rotary version of the set somewhere and will look for it.

[Dan/Panther]

I'm looking forward to seeing the after photos -- after you get the suede applied to each phone -- stitching and all!

You take on some of the most interesting projects, D/P.  If anyone can do it, I'm sure it's you!

Paul;
You've got me thinking again, and that can't be a good thing.
D/P

[teka-bb]

Anyone looking for a leather covered phone:
http://cgi.ebay.com/EUC-RETRO-1978-ITT-LEATHER-BOX-ROTARY-PHONE-/220640857584
http://cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-NORTHERN-TELECOM-NT-LEATHER-TELEPHONE-PHONE-/270555758689
http://cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-FAUX-ALLIGATOR-SKIN-LEATHER-TOP-TELEPHONE-PHONE-/270555756278
http://cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-GENIE-TELEPHONE-RED-LEATHER-DESK-TOP-NEEDS-WORK-/190408018939

[paul-f]

NSEM from The Hague (Nederlandse Standard Electric Maatschappij) was a daughter company of BTMC Antwerp in Belgium (Bell Telephone Manufacturing Company) that was owned by ITT. The circuit board of the Dutch Unifoon was designed according to Dutch PTT specifications.

I've been told that this phone itself was designed in Belgium but haven't found any proof of that fact yet.

Dutch PTT only provided this model with push buttons to their customers, the first batch was pulse dialing and the later ones were dtmf.

RTT (Belgian PTT) provided both dial and push button version to their customers.

Remco,

Here are some photos of three similar rotary sets found in the US and a similar Rhapsody pulse dial set from the UK.  The US sets clearly show the country of origin as Belgium and mention BTMC.

There seems to be quite a lot of similarity with the sets posted by d_s_k as well.

It's also interesting to see the difference in leather and plastic color.  In the rotary sets from the US, the darker leather is matched with beige plastic, while lighter leather has ivory plastic. The UK set uses dark gray plastic on light leather.  The sets from Norway may also be dark gray plastic.  Perhaps this was common with later production sets.

[paul-f]

<snip> Did Western Electric ever get into this fad with the old faithfuls, the 500, 554, 2500, Princess and Trimline?

I don't recall seeing any from WE.  ITT did make a leather covered Gondola set (Spanish version of the Trimline/Trendline).

[paul-f]

The Elite was announced with leather, but they were fairly quickly converted to vinyl as the MBAs got into the act.

Coincidentally, I just received this relevant quote on the Design Line set development from the May 1975 Bell Labs Record.  It's an interesting insight that didn't make it into the BSPs.

"For example, original plans for the Elite set called for a leather covering, and the design team learned quickly about the problems of cowhide.  Because the tanning process reveals defects such as brand markings and scars from injuries or ticks, only high-quality, fully processed hides would be purchased.  Further, each set required a large, perfect, uniformly grained piece of leather.  With an uncertain future availability of top-quality hides in quantity, and the increase in the cost of each set that leather would engender, the design team chose to use leather on the first phase and look for satisfactory ways to use vinyl sumulated leather in the near future.  (Vinyl simulated alligator skin was specified on the Exeter set, since alligator is high on the list of endangered species.)"


The image of a team of Bell Labs and Western Electric design, materials and manufacturing engineers researching hides is quite entertaining.

[McHeath]

That is a funny image, the white lab coated rocket scientists of Bell Labs, who created the transistor, learning about tick scars on cowhides.  Guess they had to roll with the times like everyone does.  Would hate to see what would have happened to phones had the granite countertop fad of today hit in the 70's! 

[paul-f]

<snip>  Would hate to see what would have happened to phones had the granite countertop fad of today hit in the 70's! 

Some came close.  They might have looked something like this...
   http://www.paul-f.com/Teleconcepts.html#ElRondo

or this...
  http://www.paul-f.com/Imagination.html#LTD

Then there were the many marble and onyx phones from Italy, of which these are a small sample...
  http://www.collectorsweekly.com/stories/166-marble-telephones-from-italy?in=user

And who could forget...

[paul-f]

Does anyone recognize this leather model, offered a while ago by a UK ebay seller?

(Edit: Filenames changed to reflect set ID.)

[teka-bb]

Does anyone recognize this leather model, offered a while ago by a UK ebay seller?

Yes, it's a German telephone made by T&N (Telefonbau und Normalzeit), it's called the E2 model from 1958.