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Stamp Magazine Staff  |  Feb 14, 2022  |  0 comments

On February 18, Royal Mail will release a miniature sheet of six stamps celebrating The Stamp Designs of David Gentleman.

The stamp-on-stamp issue is timed to coincide with the London 2022 international exhibition, and a limited edition of 10,000 numbered sheets bearing the logo of the exhibition will be produced for sale at the event only, at the same price.

Gentleman, who will be 92 years old in March, is the most famous designer of British stamps in the modern era, credited with more than 100 designs between 1962 and 2000.

Stamp Magazine Staff  |  Feb 04, 2022  |  0 comments

Royal Mail celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee with a set of eight stamps on February 4, all based on photographs of official functions over the past seven decades.

This is the first time a Platinum Jubilee has been celebrated in the UK, as Queen Elizabeth II is the longest-serving monarch in British history; she is also the fourth longest-serving in verifiable world history, and the longest-serving head of state in the world today.

The Queen came to the throne following the death of her father, King George VI, on February 6, 1952.

Stamp Magazine Staff  |  Feb 02, 2022  |  0 comments

Royal Mail has declared that Britain is entering ‘a new era for stamps’, as it introduces data matrix codes (also known as 2D barcodes) across the full range of self-adhesive Machin definitives.

Digitally coded 1st class, 2nd class, 1st Large and 2nd Large stamps were issued on February 1, in a new range of colours.

The existing make-up values of 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, £1, £2, £3 and £5 will also be replaced with barcoded stamps on April 4.

Stamp Magazine Staff  |  Jan 17, 2022  |  0 comments

Royal Mail issues a set of stamps and a miniature sheet on January 20 to celebrate the 60th anniversary of The Rolling Stones, one of Britain’s most successful rock bands.

Unlike previous issues in the Music Giants series, from 2016-21, the eight counter sheet designs do not reproduce album covers but focus on the Stones as a live act, from archive photographs.

Of the four stamps in the miniature sheet, two feature posed photographs of the band and two reproduce promotional posters for their tours.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 07, 2021  |  0 comments

The first ever British stamp which could be called spectacular was the top value in a set of five issued to coincide with the ninth Congress of the Universal Postal Union in London.

It is still worshipped by collectors.

At the centre, engraved with amazing finess, is the figure of St George killing the dragon.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 06, 2021  |  0 comments

This wonder of elegance was the fifth essay produced by the designer to this particular remit, but it was well worth waiting for.

With its narrow frame and bevelled border, the high-value from the Royal Silver Wedding set of two is a stunningly handsome stamp.

A bold but distinguished design, based on a regal photograph by Dorothy Wilding, it resembles the photo-portraits of the King and Queen that many British families had on the walls of their lounges during the war years, in order to assert their national pride and keep up their spirits.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 05, 2021  |  0 comments

A stamp marking the development of the astronomical telescope as an achievement of the millennium, and name-checking Isaac Newton as a pioneer of the science, carried a very simple and yet absolutely breathtaking image.

It’s a photograph taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, presenting false-colour imagery of the gas giant Saturn, the most visibly dramatic planet in our solar system, against the backness of space.

The planet’s mysterious and fantastically complicated ring system, first observed by Galileo in 1610, is made up of ice, rock debris and dust, with the darker Encke gap caused by the presence of the tiny moon Pan between the inner and outer elements.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 04, 2021  |  0 comments

This stamp depicts a magnificent piece of regalia worn only once in any monarch’s lifetime: the solid gold St Edward’s Crown first used for the coronation of King Charles II, who had it made to replace the one destroyed by Oliver Cromwell.

Reproduced in gold and a very regal shade of red, the image is classier than it would have been if it had attempted to show the emeralds, rubies, sapphires and pearls which adorn the crown in full colour.

The glorious detail remains, including the cross pattées and fleurs-de-lis above the ermine border, the gold monde at the intersection of the arches and the jewelled cross atop it.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 03, 2021  |  First Published: Nov 02, 2021  |  0 comments

One of the most joyous Christmas issues ever took as its theme that beloved personality of the British winter, the robin redbreast.

Whilst four of the stamps were akin to Christmas card images, the lowest value was a gem.

Its simple beauty lies partly in the contrasts between the red of the postbox and that of the bird’s plumage, and between the silvery white of the smattering of snow and the silver of the Queen’s head.

Jeff Dugdale  |  Nov 03, 2021  |  First Published: Nov 02, 2021  |  0 comments

The set of six marking the centenary of Nobel Prizes broke new ground in that each used a different printing technology.

The 40p, for example, was a scratch-and-sniff stamp and the 2nd class changed colour when exposed to heat.

But the star was the 65p, Britain’s first holographic issue.

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