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The Director of Royal Mail’s Stamps & Collectibles department Gavin Macrae has told STAMP MAGAZINE that there are ‘no plans to replace’ the famous Machin head design on GB definitive stamps.
Speaking at the Stampex in London on September 19, 2003 Macrae explained: ‘With Machin there is the temptation to update it but it’s more than just a stamp now. Because it’s been in place for such a long time you mess with it at your peril’.
The Machin head was originally issued on June 5, 1967 with pre-decimal 4d, 1/- and 1/-9d values and the basic original design for GB definitives has remained the same since.
Macrae added: ‘We have been doing a number of things with the Machins, such as the international Machins (one is shown here) earlier this year. The reality is the Machin works very well’. A number of experiments – based on photographs of The Queen shot by Lord Snowdon in March 1982 – with changing the Machin head (including an engraving by Czeslaw Slania) took place secretly in the early 1980s but in the end the decision was taken not to replace the Machin head.
Macrae also noted: ‘At some stage we will inevitably replace the head but there’s not any driver for this. In general terms the Arnold Machin head is very much with us’.
• For information on new GB stamps go to www.royalmail.com