Norvic Philatelics
Is this the world's first invisible stamp?
GB 1999 Prestige Booklet - "Profile on Print" - 16 February 1999
This book, the second in Royal Mail's 3-book series leading up to "The Stamp Show 2000" to be held in London in May 2000, is entitled 'Profile in Print', and contains 29 x 1st class stamps.
Here is a First Day Cover that I prepared for myself:
As the Australian entertainer, Rolf Harris, would say, "Can you see what it is yet?" [!]
The invisible stamp - well of course you can see it, in the middle - with the 'Ist' denomination the same as the others.
I re-arranged the stamps on the cover from the order in the booklet to get a more attractive balance. From left to right on the cover above, the stamp panes are as follows:
Pane 1 - 8 x 1st class plus a central stamp-sized label, printed photogravure by De La Rue. In orange, as are the regular 1st class stamps.
Pane 3 - 4 x 1st class in larger format (large like the 1977 Machin high values). Printed in intaglio by Enschede of Holland. Engraved by Czeslaw Slania, printed in black.
Pane 2 - 4 x 1st class in same large format, embossed self-adhesive in grey & white, printed by Walsall Lithographic.
Pane 4 - 4 x 1st class also in large format, printed in Letterpress by Harrison & Sons "before they were taken over by De La Rue" - which was last year. Printed in black
Pane 5 - 9 x 1st class small format, printed lithography by Questa in the regular orange.
If anybody is interested in the booklet, or stamps from the booklet, please e-mail me. Mint book £11.50 plus postage.
Now, revealed, by the trickery of scanner software, with decreased exposure, increased shadow and gamma.
Intaglio by Enschede
Embossed by Walsall
Letterpress by Harrisons