About a year ago, I purchased 200+ Estonian matchbox labels from the 1950s for $17 (almost 9 cents per label) on ebay. It’s a pretty neat collection. I just need to figure out some way to store them. They are roughly 1.375″ x 2″. I suppose I could make a shutterstock or iPhoto book out of them. Here and there I will be posting scans in my Flickr account and this blog. The 100% 300 dpi file can be viewed at my flickr account. I took snapshots of the entire collection which can be found at my Flickr account.
The printing technique is interesting. It’s some sort of solid ink system. The registration is usually a little bit off which adds to the charm. And the inks have a nice slight splotchy nature. It’s a technique seen emulated a lot nowadays in designs especially posters.
The one shown above features the Estonian SSR flag adopted in 1953. That’s the official flag of Estonia when under rule of the Soviet Union. EESTI NSV stands for Eesti N
ukogude Sotsialistlik Vabariik. Eesti is Estonia. Sotsialistlik is Socialist. Vabariik is People’s Republic. I don’t know what N
ukogude translates to.
E s t o n i a n
S o v i e t
S o c i a l i s t
R e p u b l ic