The fact that the “secret of time travel” had been taken from the Third Doctor after the Time Lords exiled him to Earth meant that the TARDIS control room appeared only infrequently throughout the . rst half of the 1970s. Indeed, the only part of its interior to be seen throughout Jon Pertwee’s . rst season was its console - ripped out of the main ship and installed in a garage in Inferno (1970).
Over the next couple of years, the control room interiors were assembled from existing elements in various con. gurations, until Tim Gleeson was asked to create a whole new look for its appearance in The Time Monster (1972) - where it was also required to double as the TARDIS of the Doctor’s arch enemy, the Master. Unfortunately, its ‘washing-up bowl’ aesthetic proved unpopular with the production team, leading to a further revamp by Roger Liminton for The Three Doctors (1972-73)
Barry Newbery created the most radical reinvention of the control room thus far when he produced a wood-panelled ‘second control room’ variant with a ‘Victorian sailing ship’ look for The Masque of Mandragora. This only featured in a handful of episodes in the 1976-77 season, however; a more traditional design made its debut in The Invisible Enemy (1977) and lasted out the decade.