The latest commemorative is offering collectors around the world the opportunity to acquire a new “embroidered” creation: the Gentian stamp is, like the first embroidered commemorative “Edelweiss”, a product of the Austrian embroiderers Hämmerle & Vogel. The commemorative will be sent around the world, telling the stories of embroidery and Alpine plants. The threads and the colour follow the natural shape of the Clusius gentian (gentiana clusii), discovered around 100 BC by King Gentius of Illyria.

Every single type of gentian, of which there are hundreds on this planet, is a protected species. On the stamp, the gentian is protected as a registered design. It is a work of art whose symbolic and collector’s value is much greater than the postage value of € 3.75. Poets and philosophers have praised the curative powers of the gentian roots. Many a fairytale and myth talk of the pure blue of the gentian’s petals, a colour older than any empire, the colour of the creation of the skies and the waters. Blue is the divine and earthly colour of infinity and uniqueness, preserved in the blue skin of the Egyptian gods, coveted on earth like the Blue Mauritius, or the blue tree of the Romantics as a symbol of faithfulness and longing.

On a stamp, the embroiderer’s art transforms the aura, mythology and symbolism of the gentian into a philatelic event of sustained value. The Alpine flower, embroidered using thousands of needles and fine threads, is a thing to be bought, collected, given as a gift and stuck on envelopes; in this way the embroidery and the gentian will be sent millions of times around the world as a symbol of success.