P
purpleblancmange
Guest
Above you will see a handy illustration that shows pretty much how each TARDIS prop changed over the years and how they compared to a real Police Public Call Box. Please note that the image above is just to illustrate a point and is by no means intended to be a totally accurate representation of each box.
To give credit where it's due, "The Usual Suspects" (as this drawing came to be known) was drawn by Matt Sanders with help from me.
Here's a brief guide to the props:
1963 - The Pilot Episode: Peter Brachacki had the very first TARDIS prop built for Doctor Who. It originally was unweathered and looked very pristine, however over the course of the first three stories the box was altered and weathered down.
1966 - The War Machines: During William Hartnell's last season in the show, the TARDIS prop was significantly altered. The original prop was taken away and stripped right down. Its over all height was reduced, the corner posts were simplified and the side walls were pushed out as a result.
1976 - The Masque of Mandragora: The original prop had by now become quite battered and had reached the end of its useful life. Barry Newbery was charged with coming up with a brand new prop. Although his design looks rather different from what had gone previously, it does share many key dimensions, but it is the detailing that makes it look so different.
1980 - The Leisure Hive: A new producer, a new style show and a new look TARDIS. Tom Yardley-Jones created the design of this new prop, his intension was to go back to the roots of the original Police Box look. Unlike the previous models, this TARDIS was cast in fibre glass and not a timber construction, later in 1986 a duplicate prop was cast and both were used right up until the original programme's end in 1989.
1996 - The Television Movie: Richard Hudolin based this TARDIS on the schematics given to him of the 1980s version. The producer of the movie then asked him to retro-design it to incorporate elements from the original 1963 prop and so this was the result. The construction was timber.
2005 - Rose: Edward Thomas was in over all charge of the look of the resurrected show, but it was Colin Richmond who actually designed this new TARDIS. It was quite a departure from the usual look of the TARDIS and this time around it became much taller and rather chunky. In 2008, a slightly modified version of this prop was built for the fourth series of the new programme.
