Postcrossing Blog

Have you ever received a scented postcard? I know the concept’s out there, but I haven’t run across one that has been deliberately impregnated with scent myself. Even if you have, I bet most people would be surprised to know that there have been postcards sent that smell like a comet (yup, the kind that fly around the Solar System and show up in the sky with a bright tail when they get close to the sun, like Comet Hale-Bopp), a fact I learned recently while reading Joshua Howgego’s The Meteorite Hunters. I admit, I hadn’t expected to learn anything relevant to Postcrossing in a book about meteorites, but somehow postcards follow me everywhere.

Some readers might remember the Rosetta/Philae mission which tried to land on the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014. After some technical difficulties, the Philae lander did make touchdown on the comet, providing us with a chance to learn more than ever before about what makes up a comet—or at least, what Chyumov-Gerasimenko was made of, since other comets are likely to have slightly different compositions.

It’s the info from Philae that allowed a researcher from the Open University (one of my own alma maters!), Dr Colin Snodgrass, to commission a company called The Aroma Company to make a scent that could be applied to promotional postcards. The mix they made needed to evoke a few differente elements, including ammonia, sulphur dioxide, hydrogen cyanide and hydrogen sulphide. Some parts of that aren’t so bad (hydrogen cyanide smells like almonds, and some people find it a fairly pleasant scent despite it being a poison), but the combination sounds preeeetty gross.

The author of the book I was reading actually received one of the postcards and mentioned his own impressions: he wasn’t very keen, and found the smell really stuck in his nose, but his partner actually found the scent kind of pleasant and earthy, maybe like a mineral soak for a bath, and one of the creators noted finding the scent kind of like that of a lily. No accounting for taste! You can read more about the process of creating the scent (and another writer’s reaction to it) in this New Scientist article.

Unpleasant as it sounds, I think I’d love to receive a postcard that smells like a comet. It’s amazing to realise the things we can discover about distant balls of dirty ice, and the things those discoveries can tell us about the formation of our own planet, solar system, and even universe. That’s a lot to put on a postcard…

Antonio Alcalá is one of four US Postal Service art directors tasked with designing US postage stamps — including the new Postcrossing stamps coming out later this month! 😍 For 35 years, his Virginia-based studio, Studio A, has also designed books, exhibits, and more—winning local, national, and international awards for design excellence.

Sometime ago, Antonio answered some of Clarisse’s (aka CStar9) questions about USPS stamp design, shared his thoughts on the important role of stamps in society, and described his first official postcard exchange as a postcrosser!

You’ve described stamps as “one of the few ways that our country officially brands itself.” I agree! What’s it like to be in the kitchen where the soup is made?

Being in the kitchen is exciting and exhilarating, but also complex and challenging. We may work on a single “recipe” for years and not be able to discuss any of the process except with our USPS colleagues.

And yes, stamps are a kind of brand. A brand is the outward projection of a company or organization’s personality: What do they represent? What do they want to project in terms of values?

In the case of the United States, we use the flag and our currency to communicate the ideals we want people, regardless of where they are, to associate with our country. Stamps work similarly. They are official, US-approved images that go everywhere in the nation to announce, “These are the people and subjects we feel represent the best of America.”

The stamps get produced in the tens of millions and people see them almost every day. There aren’t many other pieces of design with that kind of reach.

What are some of the unique challenges of stamp design? Have working through any of these peculiarities influenced Studio A’s larger body of design work (books, exhibits, etc.)?

There are many challenges unique to the stamp design experience. Ironically, the biggest challenge is working with such a small format. Creatives are used to working at a much larger scale, and the transition to stamp dimensions can sometimes be rocky (too much detail, colors that start to blend together, compositions that feel cramped, etc.).

The biggest lessons that have influenced my other work have to do with legal issues like copyright law, rights and permissions, etc.

You came to the stamp design world unexpectedly (and late in life), after designing exhibits for the National Postal Museum. If you could go back and chat with your younger self as a History major at Yale, what would you tell him?

I would tell him to continue doing what he was doing because it will get me where I am today!

If, however, I was to change the path somehow, I would tell the student it is more-than-okay to study the arts in college. The world needs more creative thinkers.

How long does stamp design take? What is the average timespan that elapses between Citizens’ Advisory Committee approval of an idea and the official stamp release date?

On average, stamps take two to three years, from assignment to issuance.

Some stamps are designed as singletons, sometimes a set is a pane of 4, and sometimes there are twenty designs in one set. How are those decisions made, about numbers?

We issue what we think the subject demands.

Generally, we try to limit the number of stamps in an issuance because it can get expensive for collectors who want to make sure they have one of each stamp.

I recently finished an assignment that started with four designs. Later, it evolved to ten stamps.

Sometime the subject is complex and requires the ability to show variation. Additional stamps can also make the sheet feel more compelling.

What does research look like for you?

Research can be a deep dive, going down a rabbit hole-like experience, or it may be fairly light. It may involve reading published books and magazine articles, or having conversations with consultants who are experts in the subject. USPS also contracts with a firm who helps me locate appropriate materials based on my requests.

When I’m looking for artists to partner with, it might involve looking through Instagram or online portfolios searching for what I feel is a good match for the assignment.

What is your own relationship to snail-mail, and how has that evolved over time? Anything you want to say to Postcrossers?

I love snail-mail! I like writing and receiving letters and cards, although I seem to have less time to do it these days. I still pay most of my bills the old-fashioned way (by mail). It’s always a thrill to put one of my stamp designs on an envelope before slipping it in the mailbox.

I once registered for Postcrossing. My card went to China (and took a long time to get there and be registered), and I received a card from the Netherlands. It’s so fun! Unfortunately, I no longer have the time to be an active participant.

As for Postcrossers, THANK YOU! You are engaging in a fantastic activity that helps bring people from around the world together. Please keep up your creative mailings!

What excited you most about bringing Postcrossing onto a U.S. stamp issue, and what did you want the set to communicate?

I knew Postcrossing as an international phenomena, and the US stamp program did not yet have a stamp specific to that activity. Announcing this fun, mailing activity to the country via a stamp was an amazing opportunity. The stamps are meant to be distinctive, lightly humorous, and colorful stamps communicating no matter where you are or what you do, getting and sending mail is a joy!

These stamps are triangular, which is a rare format for USPS! How did that shape influence the creative direction or composition?

Early in the development process I thought this might be a good opportunity (good subject/receptive audience) to create a stamp with a non-traditional shape. Our Global Forever stamp is usually a circle, so creating one as a triangle seemed like a fun alternative. Because I decided on this approach before hiring an illustrator, Jackson Gibbs had to work with the unusual shape from his first sketches. He got it right away and did an amazing job adapting the four “stories” to the unconventional shape.

For people that might not know, what does “art director” mean in practice for a stamp issue like this? What parts did you shepherd from start to finish?

Each of the USPS commemorative stamps is assigned to an art director. Most often, that starts with the topic and occasionally some background information. How the assignment is approached, however, is left up to the art director. In this case, I looked at what other countries around the world have published as a Postcrossing stamp. I also talked with people who are philatelists AND Postcrossing enthusiasts to get their perspectives. I then developed ideas about what I hoped to communicate and the general tone of the stamps. At this point, I also decided to try the stamps in a triangular format.

My next step was looking for an illustrator to collaborate with on the assignment. After looking at numerous options, I asked to work with Jackson Gibbs. I envisoned his playful, colorful illustrations appealing to a wide range of people from young to old. Jackson provided preliminary sketches and from those I decided on the four primary subjects. The next step was for me to determine the typography, and to identify the small changes that need to be made on each stamp until everything looked just right. The other part of my job is to communicate with USPS and the Citizens Stamp Advisory Committee the progress of the job, making updates based on their suggestions, and then presenting the final set of stamps. Finally, I prepare all the materials for our pre-press team, who turns them into files for the printers.

Our huge thanks to Clarisse for putting together such thoughtful questions, and to Antonio for taking the time off his busy schedule to answer them!

And now… a little celebration! 🎉 To mark the upcoming USPS Postcrossing stamp issue, we’re giving away 10 postcards franked with these new triangular Postcrossing stamps. If you’d like to enter, just leave a comment below and tell us: which of the four stamp designs is your favourite, and why? We’ll pick 10 winners at random and send them a postcard from the First Day of Issue ceremony. Good luck! 💌

It’s happening!! The new US Postcrossing stamps are now available for pre-order (with some fun extras too!), ahead of their official issue date on May 26.

We’ve been making “heart eyes” 😍 at these little triangles for weeks, and we can’t wait to start seeing them on postcards traveling all over the world. If you’d like to be ready for launch day, now is a good time to place an order!

Besides the stamp issue itself, USPS has also created a few collector-friendly items:

• Postcrossing Stamps: the stamps themselves! They come in a set of 8, so you get 2 of each design.
• Postcrossing Maxicards: set of 4 different maxicards, with stamps included so that you can mail them.
• Postcrossing First Day Covers: set of 4 envelopes.
• Postcrossing Digital Color Postmarks: set of 4 envelopes.
• Postcrossing Stamp Portfolio: includes a sheet of 8 stamps, a cancellation postcard and a collectible folio.
• Matted Stamps: features a square of 4 stamps, matted and ready to frame.

Sadly, USPS only ships within the United States… but hopefully people in other countries can find someone there willing to arrange a swap with them, if they are interested in some of these. ☺️

Happy pre-ordering! If you’re in the US and would like to celebrate this stamp issue with other postcrossers, there will be meetups happening around the launch date — including a very big one at the Boston 2026 World Expo on May 26. You can find the details (and other meetups being organized) on the events calendar.

Also, next week we’ll be publishing an interview on the blog with Antonio Alcalá, the USPS art director for this stamp issue, with some fun behind-the-scenes details. Stay tuned!

The writing prompts invite postcrossers to write about a different topic on their postcards’ messages every month. These are just suggestions though — if you already know what you want to write about, or the recipient gives you some pointers, that’s great too!

This month’s writing prompt was suggested by a member on the forum, and I had to have a bit of a think about how I’d answer! So we’re very curious about this one… what’s something you wish you had the courage to do?

In general, I’m pretty content with my life and don’t have a lot of regrets. That’s not to say I’m not scared of doing stuff—there are a lot of things I found difficult to start doing, like the volunteering work I did with the Royal National Institute for the Blind in the UK, or high-end raiding in Final Fantasy XIV, or applying to a dream university for further study. But I had to have a good think about something I still haven’t done because I was scared.

In the end, I think my answer is: more travel! I’ve been to France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Ireland, Canada and the US, and of course I’ve travelled within the UK. But I’m a bit of a homebody and I don’t travel a lot, even though there are places in the world I’d love to visit, like Germany, Greece and more of Italy… Since I mention in my profile that my wife and I like to visit zoos when we travel, I’ve had a lot of postcards suggesting destinations, and it’d be great to visit some of them, too!

It’s not impossible that I’ll travel again in future: maybe I’ll pluck up the courage someday. Where would you recommend I go, as a bookish person who likes museums?

And of course… if you’re stumped for what to write on your postcards this month, you can take this as your theme! We’d love to read your answers on the blog as well: what have you wanted to do that you’re scared to actually try?

It’s Earth Day, which means it’s time for our annual update on the tiny forest that postcrossers help grow in central Portugal!

As some of you may remember from previous years, this is an unusual kind of meetup because it has no postcards at all! Instead, we join Quercus (a Portuguese environmental organization that works on reforestation and conservation projects) and spend a morning planting trees in the Pinhal de Leiria, the historic pine forest that was devastated by the 2017 wildfires and has been slowly regaining life ever since.

This year’s planting day happened on March 14 and, as seems to be becoming tradition in recent years, it was another rainy morning. Luckily, we weren’t alone: a group from a pharmaceutical association was also planting nearby, which made the work feel lighter!

In the end, fueled by some delicious viriatos (a typical sweet from Viseu), our group of 13 postcrossers managed to plant hundreds of young pines. This year we had an enthusiastic 2.5 year old among us, and seeing kids involved in these events always gives us hope for the future. We like to imagine that one day they’ll come back for a picnic in the shade of these trees.

Earlier this year, storm Kristin hit the area and left a trail of destruction in neighboring towns, including a lot of broken trees in the forest. It was sad to see, but also a relief to notice that the trees we planted in previous years are still small enough that they survived the storm well and are still standing and growing. One day they’ll be taller than us!

Afterwards, we all went for lunch together, tired and full of sand everywhere, but very happy. These tree-planting meetups have become a favorite tradition of ours, and we’re very grateful that, year after year, postcrossers choose to spend a saturday morning planting trees in this important forest.

We’d love to see similar initiatives happening elsewhere too! If you know a local organization that could use a hand planting trees (or doing other outdoor conservation work), why not gather a few postcrossers and give it a try? 💪

Here’s to trees and postcards — and to caring for the Earth together!