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Monday 17 October 2011

The Arnold Machin Centenary Miniature Sheet (yawn...)


I have intended it write a short note about this sheet since it was issued, but every time I look at it, I get the uncontrollable urge to take a nap. So I've fortified myself with a strong espresso, and I'll try to get this finished before I doze off.

I suppose Royal Mail as a whole doesn't care any more, but this design is really an embarrassment. I can understand that they didn't want to pay a professional designer, but how hard would it have been to include a few other denominations and perhaps a label with Machin's portrait?

Royal Mail obviously creates stamps aimed solely at collectors; the stamp show souvenir sheets and the outrageously expensive prestige booklet panes come immediately to mind. But this is such a blatant grab of collectors' money, for an item that's barely worth mounting in an album, that even this cynic is disappointed and dismayed.

--Larry

3 comments:

Robert said...

One (slightly) interesting thing I've noticed about the sheets I have seen is they seem to have perforations of different sizes, ie the vertical perfs in the first couple of columns are bigger than the horizontal ones (especially noticeable at the intersection at the left of the first two stamps). The ellipses are also wider or narrow as you move across the sheet. I have seen one on an FDC where it was the columns at the right which showed the larger holes. May not compensate for a drab design but unusual all the same.

Anonymous said...

Well said...a true yawner. In fact, the whole business appears to have lost its way with a focus on creating quantity vs. quality. The Machin security 'features' is a great example of generating revenue - not so sure I buy into the need for the frequent changes.

Machin Man said...

I guess we should count ourselves lucky. This could have been a pane of 10 x £1.00 stamps :-)