Tag: illustration

Creative packaging design: Matchbox labels

Vintage Tempo matchbox labels

Collecting match books and matchbox labels is almost as popular, and just as much fun, as philately. A person that collects them is known as a phillumenist.

There’s a fascinating history about the development of safety match technology – and the banning of white phosphorus (a hugely dangerous chemical) as an ingredient in their manufacture.

The designs of matchbox labels can point to their age and era of production.

There are safety matches (that can only be lit by striking on a specific surface), impregnated (with paraffin) safety matches, long matches and cooks’ matches. In the past, matches were usually ‘foreign’; manufactured in Sweden, Finland, Italy, Belgium and Czechoslovakia.

There was a time when every bar and restaurant supplied customers with their branded matches. Free advertising for them and a free souvenir for you! With the advent of smoking bans around the world, they’ve become a thing of the past.

Matches, matchboxes and matchbooks are still very popular, however; they’re an essential accessory for owners of wood-burning stoves and ranges and fans of room candles.

Valiant safety matches boxIndex safety matches matchbox label
Chart impregnated safety matches matchbox labelBryant & May's Pearl Matches matchbox label
Pilot Matches matchbox labelTrilby brand safety matches label
Purple Three Torches matchbox labelRed Three Torches matchbox
Iris impregnated safety matches matchbox labelAtlas safety matches matchbox label
Various vintage matchboxes

The Original Cook's Matches boxOriginal Cooks Matches

You light up my life matchboxYou Light up My Life

Diptyque Paris and Emma Bridgewater long matches in boxesEmma Bridgewater Extra Long Matches Black Toast Strike a Light matches | Diptyque Temple des Mousses scented matches

Trio of coloured matchbox tinsMetal matchbox tin

Designer Desire: Ronald Lampitt

Montage of Ronald Lampitt illustrations

Born in Worcester, Ronald Lampitt (1906-1988) was a painter, poster designer, book and magazine illustrator and children’s author. In doing research about his output for this post, I discovered that he created material for Brock’s Fireworks – who we featured here on the blog many moons ago.

Lampitt’s periodical work included illustrations for Readers’ Digest, Zoo, Passing Show, Modern Wonder, John Bull, Look and Learn, Treasure and Mickey Mouse Weekly.

Ronald Lampitt also illustrated books for Oxford University Press and, most memorably, Ladybird Books. Titles for the latter included Understanding Maps (1967), Birds and how they Live, Plants and how they Grow, Animals and how they Live and Insects and Small Animals.

Many of these books were in collaboration with his brother-in-law, Henry James Deverson (Lampitt was married to Deverson’s sister, Mona). The two men collaborated on a number of children’s books, including The Map that Came to Life (1948, Oxford University Press), The Open Road (1962) and The Story of Bread (1964, Puffin Books).

His other association with Deverson included working on the Mainly for Children series that was published by the Sunday Times during the early 1960s.

He both authored and illustrated the children’s book, The Story of Paint, in 1962.

His advertising poster design were commissioned and produced by British Railways, Great Western Railway, London Midland & Scottish Railway, Southern Railway and Brooke Bond tea.

Find vintage copies of books that he illustrated on Abe Books and Amazon.

Image credits:
Art UK | Invaluable | Tumblr

 

Designer Desire: Valériane Leblond

Montage of Valériane Leblond artworks

Happy 2023 everybody. Every, single year, I get caught out. I keep meaning to buy one of Valériane Leblond’s exquisitely illustrated calendars, but by the time I remember, she’s already sold out. I’ll have to set myself a reminder for next year!

Valériane Leblond is a French-born artist brought up in Angers. She moved to mid-Wales around 2007 and is currently living in an old farmhouse near Aberystwyth with her 3 sons, several cats and too many chickens.

My style is influenced by folk and primitive art, and there are often stories happening in the detail. The kitchen or the hearth, the washing drying on the line, the attended garden are often present in my paintings and illustrations. My pictures convey the idea of home, and show how people inhabit the land.
The sea is not far from where I live, and going for walks in the hills or on the beach is always an inspiration. The landscape plays a big part in my work, with the passing of the seasons, the variations in colours and lights, and the ever-changing sea. credit

Valériane was short-listed for the prestigious Tir na n-Og Award annually between 2015 & 2019. Two books illustrated by her won the Welsh-language primary category; Pedair Cainc y Mabinogi (2016) and Cymru ar y Map (2019).

I also admire country folk, fishermen, housewives, and those who live off the land and the sea; especially their efforts and perseverance. credit

The list of her books include The Quilt, Little Honey Bee, Wales on the Map and Four Branches of the Mabinogi.

Valériane Leblond has also illustrated books for other authors and poets including Alison Acheson, Peter Stevenson, Siân Lewis, Caryl Lewis and Elinor Wyn Reynolds.

She sells a small selection of limited editions prints on her Etsy shop or in Oriel y Bont in Aberystwyth town centre.

You’ll find many of these books on Amazon and Abe Books. In addition, there is a selection of her greeting cards available for sale on Green Pebble.

Portrait of Valériane Leblond

All image credits

Designer Deisire: Charles Keeping

Montage of Charles Keeping artworks

Charles Keeping (1924-1988) was an English illustrator, children’s book author/illustrator and printmaker. As well as his own books, such as Black Dolly, Richard, and Shaun and the Cart-Horse, Keeping created illustrations for many other authors. For example; The God Beneath the Sea, written by Edward Blishen and Leon Garfield, and many of Rosemary Sutcliff’s historical fiction titles for children. He illustrated the complete works of Charles Dickens for the Folio Society and provided the artwork for Kevin Crossley-Holland’s The Wildman and his retelling of Beowulf.

Charles Keeping was multi-award winning. He was the recipient of two Kate Greenaway Medals (for his own book Charley, Charlotte and the Golden Canary (1967) and the 1981 edition of Alfred Noyes’s poem The Highwayman. In addition, he was a Greenaway Medal runner-up on at least another three occasions. For the 50th anniversary of the Medal (in 2005), the selection panel picked his edition of The Highwayman as one of the top ten winning works.

His illustrations for The God Beneath the Sea, by Leon Garfield and Edward Blishen won the 1970 Carnegie Medal for children’s literature. In 1974, he was a runner-up for the Hans Christian Andersen Award.

His prints can be found in many important collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum. There are books by and one about Keeping available on AbeBooks and Amazon.

Portrait of Charles Keeping

credit

Additional image credits:
Daily Art Magazine | Invaluable | Spitalfields Life | The Keeping Gallery