AT ten years old, Charlotte Kendall has never needed to use a phone box.

Yet the old-fashioned red kiosk near her home in East Hanney has always been a part of her life.

More and more recently, though, its glory had been fading.

That was until Charlotte and her parents were on holiday in Devon and walked past an old phonebox that had been converted into a library.

Her dad Steve recalled: "We mentioned that the phonebox just around the corner from us was no longer in operation, and she said 'why don't we see if we can convert it into a village library?'"

Inspired by his daughter's vision, Mr Kendall – a guitar maker – contacted the parish council on her behalf. In his words: "I said 'how about it?' and they said 'good idea'."

The council contacted BT, and the phone firm agreed to hand the box over for a nominal price of £1.

What's more, the council has decided to contribute £200 to putting up shelves inside and giving it a bit of a facelift.

Mr Kendall has agreed to a bit of extra-curricular woodwork, and in the meantime he and Charlotte have put out an appeal for books to fill their new library.

He said: "We're hoping people will bring all sorts of books: books they have enjoyed reading that they might like to pass onto somebody else.

"Once we have a few in there we hope people will come and help themselves, but also donate books at the same time.

"I suspect there will be quite a lot of people who think this is a good idea."

New data has recently revealed that almost half of all working BT telephone boxes in the county were used for just two calls or less in one year.

Owner BT said that of the 235 working boxes in Oxfordshire, about 30 were used just one or two times from October 2016 to October 2017. Another 66 went without a single call.

Oxfordshire currently has about 50 iconic red telephone boxes, with the rest made up of other types of BT kiosks.

Across the county, 48 phone boxes have been adopted from BT by community groups and councils.

The Kendalls in East Hanney are also thinking about having a village map in theirs library and other useful local information.

Charlotte, who goes to St James CofE School in the village, said she was delighted to see her dream becoming a reality.

Mr Kendall added: "Of course there will be people who will say it's just going to get vandalised – but you've got to try.