Patterns

 

The type of water powered cotton spinning mill and its factory system Richard Arkwright invented in 1771 at Cromford powered the industrial revolution.  The stamps celebrate textile design.

1982: British Textiles (Design - Peter Hatch)

I start with the most famous of them which was the 

15½p 'Strawberry Thief' (1883) pattern created by William Morris and printed in his factory.  It took days to produce and  was Morris and Co's most expensive fabric but also the most popular, the 19½p of scarlet tulips is an anonymous and untitled design printed in 1906 by F Steiner and Co, a company sometimes called the William Morris of the 20th Century.
26p a design by the artist Paul Nash who was commissioned by Eresta Silks to produce seven designs, this one he called 'Cherry Orchard' and was screen printed on silk in 1930, 29p Andrew Foster's 1973 design 'Chevron' for Textra Furnishing Fabrics. Used for curtains it was screen-printed cotton, a method that eliminated the production of expensive engraved rollers. 

1976: Europa - Handicrafts

Away from the sound of the factory floor some floral embroidery from Switzerland and

2012: Geometric Shapes

time to have  fun with an octahedron

large or small

Sunday Stamps theme - Patterns -  see them everywhere at See It On A Postcard

E to Europe

 

2001: Fabulous Hats - Butterfly Hat by Dai Rees

Although Royal Mail have for many years used non value indicators (NVI) for internal mail they had a brief experiment using E for European postage which I think started in 2001 and ran for a few years. Post to Europe was 36 pence in 2001 but as the stamp is valued for a task not a price it can still be used today when the cost is £1.85

2003: Extreme Endeavors (Design - Howard Brown)

Freya Stark in a more practical 'hat' takes you to to Europe and beyond  in her wonderful books.

2004: Royal Horticultural Society

Climbing rather than travelling - Clamatis 'Arabella'

2021: Calf of Man 70th Anniversary Manx National Trust

The Isle of Man use EU for their European postage but not all sets are NVI some are priced.

2017: Bailiwick Lighthouses

 

Guernsey NVIs only appear on their machine stamps. Going one letter further - EUR

The exception - Since the issue last year of barcoded definitive stamps, or what Royal Mail call 'everyday stamps' to the general public, they were going to be invalid to use at the end of January.  After pressure they have extended the cut off date now for another 6 months and you can still put them on your post until July or use  their swap out scheme and exchange old stamps for new.

Happily my stash of stamps for postage are all commemorative

Sunday Stamps theme this week is - E - See It On A Postcard 

Ornate Objects

2001: Al-Khanjar A'suri

The Omani dagger or khanjar not only appears on stamps of Oman but also their banknotes, is part of the national flag and printed on all official documents.  It is worn on ceremonial occasions and can be made of gold, silver, copper or brass. One has to be wealthy opt for the gold and silver and the time it can take to make can vary from a few weeks to several months depending on the material used.  An ornate national symbol.    

1989: 300th Anniversary of Arp Schnitger Organ

Of course if one wanted to see something really ornate then the era to turn to would be the baroque and above is the largest surviving baroque organ in northern Europe which can be heard every Sunday in St James Church, Hamburg making full use of its 3000 pipes and 60 registers.

1982: National Postal Museum Card Series of Post House Signs

Post office signs were just as ornate. This one is owned by the Museum for Post and Communication (the renamed National Postal Museum) in  Frankfurt am Main,  The museum gets rave reviews on Trip Advisor.

1975: Stamp Day

The stamp like the card shows a Post House sign of the Royal Prussian Establishment for Transport. At the time the different post house companies delivered mail to specific countries and a register was available to look up where to hand over ones post for the different destinations. How much easier it is today to just pop a letter in

1977: Stamp Day

a postbox.  This is a Belgian pillar box from 1852. The old Belgium pillar boxes are among my favourites although the earliest I've seen is this one.

The Sunday Stamps II prompt this week is the letter O - here for Oman, Ornate and Organ - more Os over at See It On A Postcard

Motorbikes

2013: The Three Legs of Man (Design - Emma Cooke)

Some things instantly say the Isle of Man, one is the triskelion or Thee Legs of Man, the island's symbol for thousands of years. When Emma Cooke moved from Aberdeen to the Isle of Man in the year 2000 she also was fascinated by the emblem that appears in all different contexts throughout the island and in an ongoing project started to photograph them. The stamp features one of the photographs from the hundreds she has taken.

The other image that springs to my mind are the Manx TT Races and the motorbikes

1994: Manx Tourism Centenary (Design - Colleen Corlett)

zooming around the island here shown with the Red Arrow Display team flying overhead.  This is a stamp from a rather attractive booklet they issued featuring a year of events complete with descriptions on the selvedge and caption stickers to put on your postcards.

1974: Tourist Trophy Motorcycle Races (Design - John H Nicholson)

As you can imagine stamp issues featuring motorbikes make a regular appearance on Isle of Man stamps.  This is one of the earliest (although not the first) after Manx postal independence in 1973.  It features Freddy Frith in 1937 when he set the first 90 mph plus lap of the Snaefell Mountain Course.   One of the most famous and greatest racers, Mike Hailwood, also features on this set but as I don't have that one then

1982: 75th Anniversary of Tourist Trophy Motorcycle Racing PHQ Card (Design - John H Nicholson)

here the artist shows him in 1961 when he became the first man to win three races in one week in different categories, it was a good year for him because he also won the 250cc World Championships.

2003: Post Office Vehicles (Design - Peter Hearsey)

Some people who rode the roads around the island throughout the year were the GPO telegram delivery boys on their BSA Bantams. I could have said zoomed around the island except  that would have been an exaggeration because the three-speed gearboxes were governed to restrict their top speed.

Sunday Stamps II prompt of the letter M - for Motorbike and Isle of Man - motor over to See It On A Postcard

An Old Friend

This bike has seen better days as indeed has my own, but we share lots of memories. Eeva translated the poem for me as -

"Sometimes we stopped by a neighbour, and had coffee with buns. Time went by , we had a good time together - and still have".

The card came with this stamp

2011: 100th Anniversary Kaj Frank

which makes me think perhaps the hand is just starting to make some Finnish cinnamon buns (traditionally served with coffee).  

The postcard is part of a series of summer poem cards featuring bicycles, flowers and all things of the season with poems that encourage warm thoughts of past summer days and perhaps gratitude for the people and places that have inhabited them.  

Postcards for the Weekend theme - Gratitude -  at  Connections to the World

Nana

"Nana Tête de Fleurs" 1971

This exuberant scene could be on your wall for it is a postcard of wallpaper (the background is rather more on the pink spectrum than the scan shows).  The designer is Niki de Saint Phalle (1930-2002), sculptor and painter who from 1964/5 onward produced a playful series of brightly coloured sculptures called Nana (French slang for girl or chick). These larger than life voluptuous and often athletic women play and enjoy life. On the wallpaper a girl with a head of flowers dances on a sunny day.  Niki de Saint Phalle alongside her art produced, flower vases, jewelry and  a fragrance whose bottle featured blue gold butterflies and a logo of entwined serpents.  Some of these objects were created to raise funds for her big and expensive project The Tarot Garden (inspired by the architecture of Antionio Gaudi which she saw when visiting Spain),  She started to create the Tarot Garden in the late 1970s on 14 acres of land in Tuscany, one of the people that got involved in the project was the local postman, Ugo Celletti,  who discovered a passion for mosaic work, the consequence of which that the locals often didn't get their post on time.  After her death Ugo helped maintain the garden now two of his nephews act as caretakers and thousands of people visit this corner of Italy each year.    (The New Yorker featured her story this year in Beautiful Monsters. Art and Obsession in Tuscany)

Postcards for the Weekend is "Anything you wish" joining the Linky Party at Connections to the World

Future City

Perhaps this week's theme of 'Places to Live' would include Utopia, the title of the above stamp which is one of a set produced in 2012 by Finland called - Future City  - showing "what kind of habitat we might have one day". They were issued in booklet form

of which this is the cover. The green plans form decoration throughout the pages but I'll concentrate on the stamps issued on the occasion of Helsinki being chosen as World Design Capital in 2012.  There was originally an open stamp design competition when 1,422 entries were received from which a jury of professionals and the public selected 8 so lets get on with the stamps.  The first two are very colourful

and are called simply 'Colour Power and Mix' nothing like a bit of colour to cheer a day up.  The designs are by Varpu Kangass a freelance Graphic Designer from Helsinki. The text by the stamps discusses openness  and says "For us, openness equals, transparency, curiosity, global responsibility and innovation.  In the stamp design competition we aimed to challenge people to think about their own city".

The top stamp on the next page is by the French graphic designer Chloe Chapeaublanc and accentuates the need for a diverse architecture and also possibly people.  The bottom stamp is the pristine version of the used one I showed at the top 'Utopia' (Onnela) by Sini Henttonen, then a student of textile art and design in Helsinki.

Next we have two stamps designed by children

On the left Kaupungin liike (City Business) by Daniel Kallström, a schoolboy from Helsinki and the one on the right Tulevaisuus rohkeana (which I think translates as a bold future) by Elias Ollila then a 5 year old from Espoo.

Lastly we have City Kani (City Rabbit) by Katja Hynninen, a textile designer from Tampere.  I've been lucky enough to have the company of rabbits on lawns on a number of places I have worked on industrial estates so they are well tuned in for the future city.  The bottom stamp puzzled me I thought it might be a vision of big cats roaming the streets and I didn't know how they would coexist with the rabbits, or indeed humans, but the message was more a call to arms.  Assenne muotoil which I think translates as 'The attitude of designers".  As the booklet hopefully says "Together we will build better, more livable and happier cities".

An entry to Violet Sky's Sunday Stamps II theme of - Places to Live - more stamps to see living  here

  

Sit on It

2009: Design Classics

I imagine we have all sat on one of these because it is estimated that over 14 million (and counting) of them have been made since its launch in 1963.  Designed by Robin Day this polypropylene stacking chair was one of the first chairs manufactured by injection moulding.

As the winter nights lengthen perhaps a little light is required.  George Carwardine was a car designer specialising in vehicle suspension systems when he designed and patented the anglepoise lamp in 1932.  He manufactured it himself until demand became so great that he arranged for it to be made by the Terry Spring Company, who still make a version of it today.  Originally designed for the working environment Carwardine adapted it for use in the home in 1935 and in 1937 the patent was bought by the Norwegian lighting designer Jacob Jacobson who continued to develop different versions throughout Scandinavia.

2014: Sit Comfortably!

I like the imaginative double images of these booklet stamps which highlight five modern Swedish furniture designs.  The stamps were designed by Hans Cogne, professor of graphic design and engraved by Martin Mörck and Piotr Naszarkowski.  Hans Cogne also designed the FDC and cancel.
Top row left : A chair called 'Hug' designed by Anna von Schewen who wanted to give the feeling of sitting in someone's arms and received the Excellence in Swedish Design Award in 2002.  The chair design (top middle) by Carl Malmsten (1888-1972) was inspired by a pair of old lathe Windsor style chairs during a visit to Finström Church on Åland and has become one of the most popular pieces of furniture in Sweden. The church itself has also been featured on an Åland stamp with a suitably snowy landscape.

  Yngve Ekström's (1913-1988) beautifully curved piece of furniture (top right) was voted 'Swedish Furniture of the Century' at the turn of the millennium.  A comfortable chair is what Gunilla Allard (1957-) was aiming for, her goal to make a small armchair as compact as the seat in her English sports car (bottom left). Lastly, bottom right, is an aluminium chair which was the first in production for Mats Theselius.

1992: Antique Cape Furniture

As a contrast here are some South African stamps on antique furniture from the Cape area used by the Dutch settlers. The 17th Century furniture in Cape Town workshops were made using imported wood and influenced by the styles in Holland and are known by the term Cape Dutch.  The country districts of the Cape such as Stellenbosch had Dutch style homes which were furnished with pieces made from local workshops and wood.

The styles continued to change through time but were still influence by European designs and trends.

An entry to Viridian Postcard's Sunday Stamps theme of - Furniture - here