#HTE

Cold War Product Design: Vintage Soviet Hotline Phones are Surprisingly Affordable

The idea of a hotline phone–a smooth-faced object with no keypad, that only connects to one person–is a strangely alluring one in this age of smartphones with unlimited-capacity phonebooks. There’s no screen telling you who you’re calling, or who is calling, because you’ve only got one option.

As it turns out, there are actually a bunch of these relics floating around on eBay, like this one, and they’re mostly in the USD $15-20 range. And while they were made in the USSR…

…you don’t have to worry about them being bugged. I’m not saying they’re not bugged, I’m saying your phone, computer, smart speaker etc. are all already listening to you, so what’s the diff.

I think these would look wicked in a design firm office–connecting the studio and the shop, for instance–and that blank face is just screaming out for you to slap a cool graphic onto it.