Am I Getting To Fancy With My Stamps?

The black backing is of the thick cardstock paper to prevent accidental folding of the pockets. There is a layer of plastic between the stamp and the backing to avoid even small possibility of sticking to the paper. I do not use any kind of mounting, so the stamps held in place by the pressure between stock paper and the pocket. They do move occasionally, but not too much. I use both sides of the pocket, so I can fit 18 mint stamps per page.

The point is, that it costs me $0.32 in row materials to make 1 page, plus all the labor involved. All thees just to house 18 stamps, and most of my stamps are min value.

But it looks so beautiful.

Those really do look great. And it gives you tons of room for the margin/plate numbers, etc....

I use stock pages, and I struggle with the larger sizes, they stick out...

to me $0.32 would be a negligible cost.

I'm putting minimum value stamps in vario sheets but I'm doing it one set per line (sometimes that means just one stamp) so if an average stamp costs about $0.05-$0.10 (probably less) then I will put about $0.30-$0.50 cents worth of stamps on a $1.50 vario sheet. haha the sheet is worth more than the stamps!

I would love it if someone made a sheet with different size protector strips. Say 2 - 1", 2 - 1½" , and 1 - 3" strip so you could put Stamps of different sizes on the same page. I'm far too lazy for mounts so I do everything in Varios.

I have old clear-on-black sheets that have 3 different size rows. I feel sure you can still buy them; find a manufacturer's online catalog, or call Subway.

Prinz do a 3-strip size display sheet, black card and clear strips.
139mm, 67mm and 36mm.

I decided long time ago that all stamps go in Showguard mounts and on home made album pages with issue date and scott number and what the stamp is about. Takes forever to mount a bunch of stamps but I really like to go visit my stamps. Varios sheets and those cardboard sheets just make looking at the collection miserable in my opinion. The rows are too close together and the stamps hide one another. If you don't have a complete set or the complete collection you are constanly moving stamps around UGH!!. To me the effort to mount the stamps and organize them and leave room for missing stamps is well worth the effort.
Nick

The strips of stamp mounts aren't cheap too. They are not the best for the long term storage as well (I've seen many stamps that were stuck to or deformed by these mounts). I've been looking at many different ways to make my albums. I would love to use self made album pages, but mounting stamps on those pages isn't good for stamps. Since I'm young, only 34, I want to keep my stamps for another 30-50 years, and want them to be as fresh then, as they are now. The way I make my albums now is the best way I can think of for long term storage. As Nick said, the biggest downsides - breaking sets on different pages, and moving stamps around when new additions come.

Say now that does look really fancy! but I'm with stallzer...I won't spring for costly mounts and love the vario sheets. I didn't at first because of the static cling and dust accumulation but a lighthouse album and album cover solved that. I'll set the sets all up how I want them in a vario sheet until I get a full page how I want it then transfer them to a brand new sheet and insert page into the album for protection. It may be expensive but it looks great.

My only issue is that wt1 has me totally in love with the history of everything and write-ups (darned that William! ) I could easily exhaust 3 pages of history for just one cover alone but would fastly have more shelves of vario albums than furniture in my whole house! I love the idea but my wife does not. I'm sure it would save a lot over the winter on the heating bill as insulation against the walls! lol

I was friends with a Rick Danko a very long time ago- I miss that guy alot. Amazing musician and was a friend of the families.

danko that really looks beautiful however I must warn you. You run the risk of the Stamp sticking to the black paper from Humidity and messing up the back glue. I have stamps to prove this. I used the best Black Photo paper and even some Black Stock backing. I have even had sheets stick to Glassine pages. I had to piut them in the freezer to separate the stamps from the Glassine page.
Not trying to scare you but it happened to me. I have gone to Mystic Mounts. I requested Amos Publishing to send me a sample of the Showguard mounts along with the 2013 Scott's Specialized Catalog I just ordered.I thought they may be a little cheaper than the Mystic Mounts? I only put the Mounts with Mint Stamps. I still use the Old hinges for my used stamps. When mounting them in my album.

My theme for my stamp collection is printing in all forms and anything closely associated with it. From inventors of printing processes through hand presses,stamp printing, national printing houses and newspapers etc. I mount mine on home-made album pages using Prinz stamp mounts.