I recently found my old stamp collection from when I was a child (hoping to attach some photos once I figure out how to make them the right size!) and decided I wanted to give it a go again. But this time, correctly. As you can see if I manage to upload the photos, I messily slapped stamps to a page with whatever adhesive I could find.
Despite the poor quality of this stamp collection, I really like the way I took notes about each stamp, where I got it, when, etc. I know this isn’t typically what stamp collections are for, as lots of the discussions on here seem to be about finding the rarest stamps; however, I like the idea of stamp collecting for memories.
So my question is, is there any recommended way to store stamps so that you can still take notes alongside them? I saw online that you can use stamp hinges, but can I attach these to any type of paper in any type of binder? Or is there a specific paper/binder/etc. I should use in order to keep the stamps in the best condition possible?
Thanks in advance for any help!
Regarding paper, you want to make sure it is acid free. Plenty of it is nowadays.
Yes, the hinges will attach to the paper.
You can make your own pages, and print them out. Nothing wrong with that. Many do that. remember it's your hobby. Do what you want with it, not what someone else does or tells you to.
@pogopossum, I've seen the stock books, but they look like they have really short pockets, only about the height of the stamps, so I'm not sure how well taking notes beside it would work. But thank you!
There is no single way of arranging a stamp collection, as you will have found out by now, and your collecting for memories is probably just as good as any other. For designing your new albumpages, any word processing or text publishing software will be your friend. Print boxes just a little larger than your stamps are, and put your write-up next to them, and it will look quite neat. I just hope you have used water-soluble glue when you pasted your stamps on the old pages - anything else is difficult to get rid of.
"For designing your new albumpages, any word processing or text publishing software will be your friend. Print boxes just a little larger than your stamps are, and put your write-up next to them, and it will look quite neat."
Or you could use dedicated stamp album page layout software such as AlbumEasy which is free, see the link in my signature.
Clive
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"AlbumEasy - Free software for creating custom stamp album pages"
Hi all, thanks for the help
I got an acid-free scrapbook, some acid-free cardstock, and stamp hinges today. On the subject of acid-free, I was wondering (per recommendations to print the pages) if printer ink tends to be acid-free or if I need to also purchase that?
Also, re:the hope that I used water-soluable glue... who knows! I was 7, most likely used whatever I could find. I’m not planning on trying to salvage those stamps anyways. A third of them are ripped with a piece of scotch tape over them.
Thanks again
I'm relatively new to collecting but think the Vario System of stock-pages makes the most sense. You can easily move pages around as you build the collection.
Printer ink should be OK - it cannot be too acidic, anyway, as it might lead to corrosion in the printer mechanism otherwise. Besides, printed documents are supposed to last a while.
A scrapbook might not be ideal for a stamp collection. Better use a ring binder (file folder), then you can change the order of your pages or add some in between. There are also ready-made album pages and binders, but they can be a bit on the expensive side.
Maddy, you went against all the advice to use stock pages, and are going with hinges! As a paper album man myself, I admire your spunk.
You can find lots of past discussions about how bad modern hinges are, and were much better in the old days, which I agree with. The reasons posited about why they used to be better are intriguing - the old glue worked well but was dangerous, there are patents involved, the old timers knew better what they were doing, etc.
If you're using hinges now, you have the choice of paying $20 or so online to get a pack of hinges from 50 years ago, or use the modern ones. I find the modern ones work OK as long as you just put the TINIEST DOT of moisture on them. I find if you give them a good dollop of moisture it is that much harder to peel them off smoothly. Of course sometimes I err on the side of caution too much and the stamp comes loose, but I just put it back in again. I'm sure others here might have some other advice for you on this. It also sounds like you might have hit on the next big thing - a stamp collecting/scrapbooking hybrid.
Chiming in, if the stamps are used (not mint) then use hinges, even the modern ones. If they need moving when you finally decide how you wish your collection to look, then they can be soaked and dried again.
If you leave the stamps on paper and don't want to keep the whole envelope, trim it so that the postmark remains whole. In my humble opinion, that looks much more interesting than a stamp with only part of a postmark.
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