Sinatra Stamp Matches His Famous Blue Eyes
When you see the Frank Sinatra stamp design, it's basically what the Postal Service and artist Kazuhiko Sano presented to the family.
"We were thrilled immediately," Sinatra's daughter Nancy tells The ShowBuzz's Lloyd de Vries. "It was absolutely beautiful."
The stamp design, which was unveiled in Beverly Hills, Calif. today, is a vertical format, and shows Sinatra in the mid-1950s.
Some stamp designs go through many revisions before the family is satisfied. In this case, Sinatra says, there was only one change.
"The only thing we requested was that it be changed from beige and sepia tones, to more of Dad's colors," she said. "Particularly blue."
"We've had a lot of requests for a Frank Sinatra stamp, certainly one of the great American icons, and to be able to feature him in our stamp program is a big thrill for all of us," Dave Failor, executive director of Stamp Services, told de Vries.
Sinatra died May 14, 1998.
A native of Japan, Sano studied painting in Tokyo before moving to San Francisco in 1974 to study at the Academy of Art College. He designed 12 of the 15 stamps in the Celebrate the Century series in 1999.
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When the Sinatra stamp will be issued will depend largely on whether the Postal Service raises rates in the spring. The release is likely sometime in May or June.
Many stamp collectors had been surprised when the 2008 stamp program was first announced in August, and Sinatra wasn't in it, says de Vries. Bette Davis will be the entry in the Legends of Hollywood series; the Sinatra stamp is not part of any series.
Most of the remaining designs for 2008 stamps will be released between Christmas and New Year's Day. The designs for Lunar New Year, Alzheimer's Awareness, Charles W. Chesnutt (Black Heritage Series), and American Journalists (including CBS News' Eric Sevareid and George Polk), have already been made public.