Envelopes, Cuts, And Postal Cards

Yes, I realize that how you collecting something and how you store or display it is a matter of taste and personal preference. That's what makes this hobby great. That said, I'm looking for input on how other people store and display their collected envelopes, cut squares, postal cards, and the like. Mine seem to have just accumulated in a shoe box waiting for me to decide what to do with them. They deserve better! Ideas and thoughts? I do kick myself at times when I look through this box. As a 10 year old newbie collector, I actually saved 'cuts' from postal cards instead of saving the entire card. I should probably let those go. lol Anyway, the temptation is to just mount the cut squares on pages with hinges in some kind of chronological order, as my Mystic album does not provide spaces for them (nor do most others, I assume). I'd hate to start invest in pages with pockets for the postal cards and full envelopes, as I'm sure I'd be spending much more than the cards are worth. I look forward to your ideas and input.

Yes, for everyday collections, the Pocket Pages *are* expensive, both in terms of the per-item cost, and in terms of shelf space.

So its sleeving & bagging & boxing for me. For now.

I suggest that you buy one binder and twenty bucks worth of Pocket Pages and fill it with pieces that you would rather see in an album than a box.

This might be a representative sampling of all of the different types of postal stationery in your pile ... a Teaching Album, as it were.

I would think less about the individual collector/market value of each item, and more about the story it might tell, especially alongside the others.

If you like that album, you can always make another ;)

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey (who is sorry about the cut squares, and hopes that is the biggest mistake you will ever make in your life)

Dave

I collect cigarette cards. You might find the pages produced to house those could provide a home for a diverse range of covers, cards etc. This is a GB site, but I presume there is similar material available in the US.

http://www.worldstamps.co.uk/cig_ca..._card_albums

Geoff

ADD and OCD at it's best for me. I started simple enough and bought a bunch of 2" x 2" "coin" clear pages and went from there with my cut squares. I spent a lot of time labeling them all, making mistakes and having to back track and reprint new labels.





Like a lot of homemade things it was a good idea in theory but the first issue I started to have was I didn't want to start bending all the cut squares, and when I looked through I saw all the numbers on the pages behind it. So I had a bunch of comic book cardboard backs. I spent a ton of time measuring on a guillotine paper cutter getting the right size for each pocket. Good, problem solved. Next problem is that the cardboard pieces started sliding out. Awesome. So I went out and got some 2 sided tape and tapped the back of the cardboard pieces to the backs of the pockets so they wouldn't slide. Done. Now I don't like hinging and stamps. So I don't as much as possible. Problem became that I now had the cut squares sliding around in the pockets and sliding out, so now I had to hinge the stamps to the cardboard, and put some kind of hingless mount to the cut squares I might think are valuable.





Now I'm good. Problem is I have been collecting stamps up until about 1980 and not much beyond. Well, not all cut squares are actually square, so now I had to cut out between the squares so that I could display the longer ones like surcharges.





So at the end I found this.

Stamp collecting + OCD + DIY =

I buy A4A (8-1/2" x 11") black cardstock interleaving from hobby stores, whack it with the 3-hole punch, and call it 'done'.

You can buy 'double-size' and cut it down if you need the interleaves to precisely match the pocket pages.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Yeah sooner or later every pocket should have a cardboard piece in it its just annoying to cut them so I've kinda been putting them in as many as go. I thought about the stock paper backing but I also wanted the plastic pages to be a little more rigid as it tended to bend the cut squares when I turned the pages.

Okay, so how about:

- hinge the cut squares to a page (heavier quadrille);

- insert the page & and a truly stiff stiffener into a page-size pocket, to wit:

http://www.bcwsupplies.com/cat/pro-...e-100-ct-box ... The BCW Pro 1-Pocket page is an acid free archival quality product that is perfect for storing periodicals or 8½ X 11 sheets ...

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Might work for some, but for me I'm already fairly invested in what I got. I went the way I did for 2 reasons.
1. I really hate hinging my stamps. I've spent a lot of money on hinge less mounts, to the point that I'm mounting each revenue stamp with hinge less mounts. Even though I eventually had to hinge some of the stamps, the theory was sound.
2. I liked the idea that I would be able to have clean, neat rows. This goes back to the OCD in me that doesn't really go to extremes in other parts of my life, ie I don't have to turn lights on exactly 5 times, but when it comes to my stamp collecting I like things clean, neat and organized. If I were to go with what you're suggesting, I would never be able to keeps the same uniformed look I have with the 2x2 pocket squares I bought.

So, yeah, I'm kinda stuck with what I got because at this point I personally have too much time/money invested into it to change it up much now. I just wanted to let Dave know what I had done. It's just the way I went that eventually worked out for me after some headaches. As far as cut squares goes I still think this is the best for me, despite the pain in the ass it has been.

Also the thin cardboard I am now hinging the cut squares too is actually acid free archival quality, and since there are spaces between each pocket I can still turn the pages even though there is stiff cardboard behind every cut square. I think overall I'm happy with the way it turned out despite the headache. Now I just need to work on filling the 878239201 holes I have in the book I've made. :-)