"Their romance has a fairy-tale-like quality. Highly sensitive, romantic photography in the modern idiom seems most appropriate". This was the brief given by the British Post Office for the design of two special stamps to mark the marriage on November 14th of Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips.

The result is two stamps which show the couple in an informal close-up. They will be issued at 3 1/2p and 20th, and will also carry a silver profile of the Queen, and the date of the wedding in Westminster Abbey. The 3 1/2 Stamp will be printed in violet, the more expensive stamp in light brown.

Photographs of the couple, submitted by Lord Lichfield, a cousin of the Queen, were chosen for the final design which was approved within a month of the announcement of the Princess' engagement on May the 29th. Special first-day covers, bearing both stamps, will also be issued by the Post Office, on the day of the wedding.

SYNOPSIS: The British Post Office will issue two special stamps to mark the November wedding of Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips. Designs were called for immediately after the engagement was announced on May the twenty-ninth.

Within a month, the final design was chosen. Lord Lichfield, a cousin of the Queen, submitted an informal closeup of the couple. The Post Office brief stressed the romantic nature of the marriage, and called for a modern approach. Miniature painted portraits, photographic portraits and designs based on monograms were considered before Lord Lichfield's photograph was approved, together with a design by two Englishmen.

The stamps will be issued at 3 1/2p and 20p. They'll carry a silver profile of the Queen, and the date of the wedding. The 3 1/2p stamp will be violet, the more expensive stamp will be violet, the more expensive stamp, light brown.