The curbside mailbox seen throughout rural and suburban America is a design that’s recognisable throughout the world – but these days lots of homeowners are pimping it up, as these fascinating and amusing photographs reveal.
The mailbox design we’re all so familiar with dates back to 1916. It’s called the Joroleman mailbox, after Roy J Joroleman, the Post Office worker who created its look.
Fast forward to 2017 and this classic design is being customised to resemble SpongeBob SquarePants, a minion from the Despicable Me animations and an X-Wing fighter from the Star Wars movies, among others.
Others are more whimsical – there’s a fairytale mushroom and a mailbox being held by a baby turtle hatching out of an egg.
Then there’s the homeowner who put his mailbox for bills well out of reach.
Scroll down for some truly first-class mailbox designs.
Elmo from Sesame street has been cleverly re-imagined in the mailbox on the left while SpongeBob SquarePants looks first-class on the right
Pushing the envelope: It’s Jurassic larks all around with this impressive mailbox
Egg-cellent: The creators of the mailbox on the left really shelled out on materials. Pictured on the right, meanwhile, is a desperate attempt to avoid paying the bills
The homeowner behind this design really has cooked up something special
On a lawn far, far away… is this rather cool X-Wing mailbox
We don’t know what triggered the idea for this one, but the result is dramatic
Once-upon-a-time, a mailbox was redesigned to resemble a fairytale-style mushroom
Behold this most despicable of designs – a mailbox minion!
Driven creativity: Probably one of the coolest mailboxes you’ll ever set eyes on
There’s a joke to be made here about where the post person can shove the mail…
Admittedly, this isn’t a picture about a mailbox design, but was too funny not to include
Musical mailbox? Not quite, but it’s a design that will strike a chord with many
The mail will no doubt be safe in this design
As seen on imgur.com, www.gosocial.co and elsewhere.