THE Spitfire, the miniskirt and the cat’s eye have all been selected as candidates for a public vote on the best of British design.

The red telephone kiosk and the Chopper bicycle are also among 25 items that will compete to win The Great British Design Quest, which is a collaboration between the BBC and the Design Museum. Each design will be championed by a celebrity, such as the broadcaster Jeremy Paxman (the Spitfire) and the comedian Dave Gorman (the world wide web).

During The Culture Show last night, it became clear that the champions have decided to play dirty and undermine their rivals. Mr Paxman sneered at the Raleigh Chopper, the telephone box and the Dyson vacuum cleaner. “Would the world have been different if we had not had a Chopper bicycle, if the telephone box had been designed differently . . . if we hadn’t had the Dyson vacuum cleaner or the Sgt Pepper album cover,” he asked. “I don’t think so. And it would have been different if we hadn’t had a Spitfire.”

The designer Wayne Hemingway, who nominated the Chopper, admitted that it had been less influential than Harry Beck’s London Underground map and the Routemaster bus. But he said that Mr Paxman needed to prove that the Spitfire was supreme in the air.

“Can Jeremy Paxman say that it was the Spitfire that was supreme rather than the pilots,” he asked. None of the champions pointed out that it was the Hurricane, not the Spitfire, that did most to change the course of history in the Battle of Britain.

Mr Gorman argued that the aeroplane was no match for the World wide web, invented by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. “You can’t imagine how you lived without it,” he said.

The interior designer Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen said that only the red telephone box could be considered the “holy grail” of design. “It’s all in the silhouette, in the proportion of it,” he said. “There’s no twiddleness that’s unnecessary.”

The list includes the album cover for New Order’s Power, Corruption and Lies. A shortlist will be announced on February 16 and the winner on March 16.

Vote at www.bbc.co.uk/designquest

THE LONG LIST

Red telephone kiosk, designed in 1962
London Underground map, 1931
Anglepoise lamp, 1932
Cat’s eye, 1932-34
Supermarine Spitfire aircraft, 1934-35
London A-Z, 1936
Penguin paperback, 1946-49
Routemaster bus, 1947-56
Mini, 1957-1959
Road and motorway signs, 1957-67
Dr Martens AirWair boot, 1960
E-type Jaguar, 1961
Miniskirt, 1962
Aston Martin DB5, 1963
The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover, 1967
Raleigh Chopper, 1968-70
Concorde, 1969-76
Sinclair Executive electronic calculator, 1972
The Face magazine, 1981
New Order’s Power, Corruption and Lies album cover, 1983
World Wide Web, 1989

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• UK regional accents thrive against the odds
• ‘Scarecrow’ wind farms put rare birds to flight
• What an anti-climax: G-spot is a myth