All five issuances in the Lighthouses series are the product of the same creative team: artist Howard Koslow and Art Director Howard Paine. An art director at the National Geographic Society for more than 30 years and a former member of the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee, Paine has supervised the design of more than 400 U.S. postage stamps.
Developing stamp portraits for popular and historically significant figures often requires the Postal Service to balance competing viewpoints. Learn how family opinion shapes stamp artwork.
California-based artist Kazu Sano, who also created the art for the popular Longfellow & Sinatra stamps, worked with art director Derry Noyes to recreate the iconic Bob Hope.
The Gulf Coast Lighthouses stamps are the fifth issuance in the popular Lighthouses series, which began in 1990. The series demonstrates the creative reach of a long-term collaboration between illustrator and art director. It also reflects some of the big changes in stamp manufacturing over the past two decades. Enjoy all 25 designs in the series.
Richard Wright, author of Native Son and Black Boy, becomes the latest stamp in the Literary Arts series. Wright joins other luminaries such as Ernest Hemingway, Edith Wharton and Tennessee Williams.
We spoke with Terry McCaffrey, manager of Stamp Development, about the Literary Arts series and its origin and development. Read what one of the foremost authorities on the subject has to say about these striking and popular stamps.
In this continuation of our July interview, Paine shares the details of the Flags of Our Nation stamps: discussing how the designs emerged, his role as art director, and his relationship with friend and stamp artist Tom Engeman.
