Postcrossing Blog

Good news, everyone! On January 2nd, Belpochta (the Postal Operator of Belarus), will launch a new Postcrossing stamp! Talk about starting the New Year with a bang! :)

Here’s what it will look like:

Isn’t it bright and cheerful? Each individual stamp measures 28×30mm and was designed by Inga Turlo.

The Belarusian Postcrossing community will be hosting a meetup on the launch day, which will take place in Minsk’s main post office. Stamps will be bought, and lots of cards will be signed and stamped with the special first day of issue cancellation mark… so if you’re in the area, do join them! :)

We’ve said a couple of times before, but it bears repeating: it’s an incredible distinction for Postcrossing to be featured on a postage stamp. Our heartfelt thank you to Belpochta for deeming the project worthy of such an honor – and of course, to all the postcrossers in Belarus. This stamp wouldn’t be possible without your enthusiasm! :)

Happy holidays everyone… and happy Postcrossing!

You might have heard the name PostEurop before, most likely because they organise the yearly EUROPA stamps competition. What you perhaps don’t know is that their functions go well beyond this task: through their several forums and groups, PostEurop oversees the cooperation between 52 public postal services in the European continent, in a variety of topics such as social responsibility, best practices or quality of service.

Last week, PostEurop celebrated its 20th anniversary with a Plenary Assembly and several other events. Since Postcrossing is very active in Europe, PostEurop invited the attending delegations to take part in an exhibition about Postcrossing – by sharing what the project was like in their country.

Sixteen countries accepted the challenge and made a stand with general information and statistics, and shared some postcards sent and received. Other PostEurop countries that didn’t know about Postcrossing yet, had the opportunity to learn about the project. Here are some photos from the event:

Belgian postcrossers were also invited to come around and check out the stands, and despite the inconvenient schedule in the middle of the week, some did come! There was even a tiny post office where cards and stamps could be purchased and stamped with a special anniversary cancellation stamp.

Oh, by the way, the winners of this year’s EUROPA stamps competition were announced during the plenary: Finland and Turkey took home the big honours!

PostEurop is once again hosting their yearly competition to choose the best EUROPA stamp of the year!

If you’ve seen the new stamps, you’ll know that the theme for 2013 is Van of the Postman. Every country has its own means of moving mail around – from bicycles to trucks, old school or futuristic options. They are a visible and recognisable symbol of the postal services’ connection to their communities.

Here is a small selection of the stamps on this year’s competition:

PostEurop says:

Those vehicles painted with distinctive colours are seen each day on almost every road and even highways across Europe, carrying personal effects and messages to millions of customers each day. The modern day vans are quick, efficient and more ecological compared to historical vehicles. Depending on the country, its culture, terrain and climate, each postal operator has their own story to tell. So, philatelic designers had set out to work on their interpretive designs capturing the past and/or present and the results are here.

Aren’t they all lovely? We hope to receive a lot of postcards with EUROPA stamps this year… but first, let’s vote on which one of them is the best! :)

To see all the stamps and vote, go to the competition page and pick your favorite. May the best stamp win!

PS – We’re always curious to know… which one did you pick?

As some of you already know from previous editions, a new Chinese Year means a new exhibition at the Singaporean Philatelic Museum!

The theme of this year’s exhibition is Snakes and Ladders, and all postcrossers are invited to contribute to it by sending in their snake-themed postcards to:

Singapore Philatelic Museum
23B Coleman Street
Singapore 179807
Singapore

As with the previous exhibitions, the museum will send a postcard back to all of those who include their address!

The exhibitions at the Singapore Philatelic Museum are usually very interactive, and especially attractive to the younger visitors of the museum – so please send a message to the little ones! You can tell them about your favourite snake, or just say hi! Bonus points if you can find stamps with snakes as well!

Here are some photos from this year’s exhibition, which will run until September:

Doesn’t it look neat? You can tell all the effort that goes into making this a great showcase, so if you’re in Singapore, don’t miss it! :)

We’ve mentioned the EUROPA stamps a couple of times on the blog before, but never properly introduced them… so if you’re interested in the history of this postal collectible, this post is for you!

The idea of making a “join stamp emission” came up in 1952, as a way to symbolise the joint community of interest and objectives that was starting to take shape in Europe. When the Treaty of Rome was signed some years later, the six countries that joined the new European Coal and Steel Community (Belgium, France, West-Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands), issued a commemorative stamp: the first EUROPA stamps.

The stamp design was made by the French artist, Daniel Gonzague, it was a tower formed by the 6 letters of the latin word for Europe: EUROPA.

The newly created European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations (CEPT) took over the administration of the EUROPA stamps in 1960. In 1973 they decided that, in order for stamps to remain interesting for collectors, the common design should be replaced by a common theme, that each country was free to interpret in their unique designs. The themes would be chosen as a way to bring the different countries together to represent Europe.

In 1993, the management of the EUROPA stamps was taken over by PostEurop and the CEPT logo was then replaced by the new EUROPA logo. Today, all of these stamps that are released are done so by PostEurop, the association which represents the interest of European public postal operators.

In addition to deciding the themes of the future EUROPA stamps, PostEurop members have also created an annual competition, where everyone can vote for the “Best Europa stamp” of the year.

The popularity of the EUROPA stamps prompted many smaller administrative regions or special territories to express their interest in joining the group of issuing countries, and thus the circle grew larger. Currently, over 60 European countries issue EUROPA stamps annually.

To learn more about these special stamps, check out Jürgen’s fantastic blog on EUROPA stamps (which he has been collecting since 1987). He also wrote a comprehensive 5-part series on the history of the stamps, which he kindly allowed us to condense for this blog post.