Royal Mail is marking the 500th anniversary of the death of Leonardo da Vinci on February 13, with a set of 12 stamps featuring a selection of his drawings held by the Royal Collection.
The 550 drawings in the collection were acquired by King Charles II around 1670 and are one of the world’s most important hoards of Leonardo’s original work.
Almost 150 examples are being displayed separately at 12 museums and galleries across the UK this year, and then subsequently together in the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace.
The Stamp Classics miniature sheet, to be issued on January 15, is billed as a celebration of Royal Mail’s history, and of organised philately, on the occasion of 150th anniversary of the Royal Philatelic Society London and the 50th anniversary of the opening of the original Postal Museum by the Queen.
Its three 1st class and three £1.
55 values are all simple stamp-on-stamp designs, each highlighting a key issue from a different reign.
Royal Mail issued a miniature sheet of six stamps to mark the 70th birthday of the Prince of Wales on November 14.
All based on photographs, the images depict Prince Charles undertaking official duties and with his family.
The border shows the heraldic badge of the Prince of Wales, with its three white ostrich feathers emerging from a gold coronet and the motto ‘Ich Dien’ (‘I serve’, in German), and has a bilingual inscription in Welsh and English.
This year’s Christmas stamp issue, released on November 1, is entitled Royal Mail Delivering Christmas, and shows scenes of everyday life with the postbox at their centre.
A range of pedestal, wall and pillar boxes are featured, from six different reigns, in urban and rural settings, but all in suitably wintry conditions.
As in other recent Christmas issues, eight values are available in self-adhesive guise from counter sheets, and they also appear together in a gummed miniature sheet.
Continuing its decade-long fascination with film and television franchises, Royal Mail will release a special issue devoted to the Harry Potter films on October 16.
Ten sheet stamps illustrate some of the best known young characters and modes of transport from the films, while a five-stamp miniature sheet depicts professors from Hogwarts School, setagainst a background of the magical Marauder’s Map.
All the images are based on film or publicity stills, and Royal Mail says the stamps have hidden details visible only under ultra-violet light.
Royal Mail concludes its poignant five-year series commemorating the centenary of the Great War on September 13, with the First World War 1918 set.
Like each of the preceding issues, it focuses on one year of the world-changing conflict, with one stamp exploring each of six themes: poppies, poetry, portraits, art, memorials and artefacts.
They concentrate less on how the war changed the course of history, and more on its impact on individual lives, millions of which were ended or transformed.
Royal Mail issued a set of eight stamps on August 30 to mark the bicentenary of The Old Vic theatre, one of the most influential venues in the history of the British performing arts.
Opened in May 1818, on reclaimed marshland south of the newly built Waterloo Bridge in London, the Old Vic was originally called the Royal Coburg Theatre, and from 1833 the Royal Victoria.
It adopted its current name after 1871, when it was rebuilt with a finer 2,300-seater auditorium.
Royal Mail will mark the 250th anniversary of one of the greatest voyages of discovery in history on August 16, with the Captain Cook set of six counter sheet stamps and the Endeavour Voyage miniature sheet of four.
Lieutenant James Cook set sail from Plymouth on August 26, 1768, on the first of his three famous voyages to the outer reaches of the known world.
Also on board HMB Endeavour were nearly 100 men, including astronomers, artists and scientists.
Royal Mail will issue a set of six stamps and a four-stamp miniature sheet devoted to Hampton Court Palace on July 31.
Located beside the River Thames west of London, this is the most extensive surviving Tudor building in England, and one of the grandest palaces in Britain, ranked among its top historic tourist attractions.
Given by Cardinal Thomas Wolsey to King Henry VIII, who loved it as a place to hold court and go hunting, it was developed into the most modern royal residences of the early 16th century.
Royal Mail issued a set of eight stamps on June 26 celebrating the 50th anniversary of the BBC television sitcom Dad's Army.
Written by Jimmy Perry and David Croft, Dad's Army ran for nine series, adding up to 80 episodes in total, broadcast between 1968 to 1977.
In its heyday it attracted more than 18 million viewers, making it one of the most popular series ever; offshoots included a radio version and a feature film.
The 250th anniversary of the Royal Academy of Arts is marked by a set of stamps issued on June 5.
Royal Mail specially commissioned works of art by six current Royal Academicians, several of which give a personal impression of the organisation’s famous Summer Exhibition, which has been held every year since 1769.
Founded in 1768 by King George III, the RA is an independent, privately funded institution, with charitable status, led by eminent artists and architects, whose aim is to promote the visual arts.
Royal Mail has produced a miniature sheet of four stamps to celebrate the Royal Wedding of Prince Henry of Wales and Meghan Markle in St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle on May 19.
Announced only four days in advance, it will be issued on the day of the wedding, although this is a Saturday.
Royal Mail’s upcoming stamp issue, released on May 11, is devoted to Owls.
It features the five species of owl which live and breed regularly in Britain, by way of one se-tenant strip of five illustrating adults and another showing juveniles.
Usually hunting for small mammals at night, owls are among the most successful predators in the bird world, thanks to eyesight which excels in low-light conditions, acute hearing and the ability to fly almost silently.
A set of six stamps to be issued on April 17 will celebrate wildlife which has been successfully reintroduced into Britain following its extinction in the wild.
In the past two centuries it is estimated that more than 400 species of animals and plants have disappeared from the UK, usually due to the loss, degradation or fragmentation of their natural habitats.
Thanks to the efforts of conservationists, scientists and volunteers, however, a number of programmes have successfully reintroduced some to their former environments, where they are flourishing once more.
Royal Mail will celebrate the centenary of the Royal Air Force with a set of six counter-sheet stamps and a four-stamp miniature sheet on March 20.
Established on April 1, 1918, through the merger of the Royal Flying Corps (the air arm of the British Army) and the Royal Naval Air Service (the air arm of the Royal Navy), the RAF is the world’s oldest independent air force, in the sense that it is not controlled by another branch of the military.
It played major roles in winning World War I and World War II (not least in protecting Britain from invasion by Germany in 1940), in projecting British power during the Cold War, and in waging more recent conflicts such as the Falklands War, the Gulf War, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
