Uploaded December 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Hidden in the back corridors of Alexandra Palace; I found one of the rarest televisions ever made. The Ferguson Reflections from 1986; a limited run of just 500 sets built to celebrate 50 years since the BBC began the world’s first regular TV broadcasts from Ally Pally in 1936.
It’s a modernised reproduction of the pre-war Ultra mirror-lid TV; complete with a TX9 chassis; a vertical cabinet design; and a reflected picture created by reversing the scan coils so the CRT image displays correctly in the mirror. Early TVs were built upright because they looked like furniture; people feared the glass might explode forwards; and the tubes were nearly four feet long.
Finding one of these tucked away exactly where British television began is a perfect time-capsule moment.
#RetroTech #VintageTV #BBC #AlexandraPalace #UltraTV #FergusonReflections #BroadcastHistory
Hidden in the back corridors of Alexandra Palace; I found one of the rarest televisions ever made. The Ferguson Reflections from 1986; a limited run of just 500 sets built to celebrate 50 years since the BBC began the world’s first regular TV broadcasts from Ally Pally in 1936.
It’s a modernised reproduction of the pre-war Ultra mirror-lid TV; complete with a TX9 chassis; a vertical cabinet design; and a reflected picture created by reversing the scan coils so the CRT image displays correctly in the mirror. Early TVs were built upright because they looked like furniture; people feared the glass might explode forwards; and the tubes were nearly four feet long.
Finding one of these tucked away exactly where British television began is a perfect time-capsule moment.
#RetroTech #VintageTV #BBC #AlexandraPalace #UltraTV #FergusonReflections #BroadcastHistory
