Royal Mail will issue a set of eight stamps paying tribute to Royal Navy Ships on September 19.
As an island nation, Britain’s prowess in shipbuilding and navigation has been crucial in its history, and the Royal Navy was key to forging the British Empire and to keeping enemies at bay, from the Spanish Armada to the Nazis.
The oldest of the armed forces (and therefore known as the ‘senior service’), Royal Navy has its roots in the English Navy of Tudor times and was formally established in 1546.
The 70th anniversary of the marriage of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip on November 20 is marked by the issue of a six-stamp miniature sheet entitled Royal Wedding: Platinum Anniversary.
It comprises black-and-white photographs of the couple taken during 1947: two on the day of their engagement, two on their wedding day and two while on honeymoon.
These are presented in se-tenant pairs of different values, while the sheet border features a detail of the wedding gown designed by Norman Hartnell.
Royal Mail has produced a miniature sheet of four stamps to celebrate the Royal Wedding of Prince Henry of Wales and Meghan Markle in St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle on May 19.
Announced only four days in advance, it will be issued on the day of the wedding, although this is a Saturday.
Royal Mail issued a set of eight stamps on October 19 to celebrate the passion of rugby union, marking the 150th anniversaries of the formation of the Rugby Football Union and the first international match.
The dynamic designs feature famous players and iconic moments in key international matches within living memory, giving equal billing to the four nations of the British Isles.
They also give equal coverage to the men’s and women’s games, even though the first Women’s Home Nations Championship was staged as recently as 1996.
Royal Mail will issue a set of stamps celebrating the 8th Rugby World Cup on September 18, the day England face Fiji in the opening game of the tournament.
Wales, Scotland and Ireland are also among the 20 competing nations, in a competition which will comprise 48 matches played at 13 different venues (10 around England plus the Millennium Stadium in Wales), culminating in a final at Twickenham in London on October 31.
The eight 1st class stamps, available in four se-tenant pairs, convey the power and dynamism of rugby union in the context of the sport’s scoring moves and set pieces.
Royal Mail issued a set of eight stamps on September 3 to mark the 100thbirthday of Rupert Bear, Britain’s longest continually running comic strip.
The anthropomorphic bear’s fantasy adventures with his young friends in the idyllic village of Nutwood first appeared in the Daily Express newspaper on November 8, 1920, and quickly became a children’s favourite.
Initially the stories were written by Herbert Tourtel and illustrated by his wife Mary.
Royal Mail’s Seaside Architecture stamp issue, to be released on September 18, celebrates the infrastructure that makes the uniquely British seaside holiday possible.
Six stamps from counter sheets feature piers, lidos, bandstands and shelters from around the UK’s most popular resort towns, aiming to illustrate a wide range of architectural styles from their heydays.
An accompanying four-stamp miniature sheet concentrates on the theme of piers, showing four from the Victorian era.
Royal Mail’s first new issue of 2016, released on January 7, commemorates what Sir Edmund Hillary described as ‘The greatest survival story of all time’.
Entitled Shackleton & The Endurance Expedition, the eight-stamp set recalls the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition led by Sir Ernest Shackleton in 1914-17, which is regarded as the last expedition of the heroic age of polar exploration.
As an attempt to make the first land crossing of Antarctica via the South Pole, it was a dismal failure.
Royal Mail will issue a set of 10 1st class stamps on April 5 to mark the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare, the most published and most performed dramatist in history.
The designs pay tribute to the genius of ‘the immortal bard’ by reproducing famous quotes from eight of his plays and two of his poems, in a variety of typefaces and styles.
Designed by The Chase, the stamps are printed in litho by International Security Printers, in se-tenant strips of five.
The set of stamps to be issued on 12 April celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Royal Shakespeare Company, Britain’s most famous publicly funded theatre company.
It was in 1961 that famous director Sir Peter Hall founded the modern RSC as a permanent company, although earlier companies had been putting on seasons of plays in Stratford-upon-Avon, William Shakespeare’s birthplace,
since 1879.
The six counter sheet stamps highlight six famous productions of Shakespeare plays, in most cases showing living actors who are eminently recognisable, albeit in character.
Royal Mail released a set of stamps and a miniature sheeton August 18on the theme of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes.
Although hailed as a celebration of ‘Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’sSherlock Holmes’, the issue was entitled simply Sherlock, and the six counter sheet stamps depict characters and scenes from the BBC television series, Sherlock.
Each stamp portrays a character and reproduces scenes from an episode of the series, which wasaired from 2010-17 and features modern interpretations of the mysteries, written by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, with a more irreverent tone and the inclusion of 21stcentury technology.
On January 20, Royal Mail will issue a Smilers 2015 miniature sheet, introducing eight new 1st class stamps expressly intended for use in personalised Smilers sheets.
The range of designs that customers can choose from is refreshed from time to time, and this is the first new set since a miniature sheet in 2010; previous sets were issued in booklets in 2005 and 2006.
The idea is to offer greater choice and flexibility when it comes to celebrating big events, from weddings and births to birthdays and other achievements, and sending ‘thank you’ messages.
