February 17, 2026

Mike Pryor (UK)

Since meeting the legendary collector and founder of the Cornish Match Company in 1971, David van der Plank, I have had a deep interest in Spanish Matchboxes and the history of the Spanish Match industry which began in 1836.

My collection contains Spanish examples from the 19^th, 20^th and 21^st centuries, and although the majority of these are labels I do have a good number of beautiful complete boxes.

Like most collectors I also have many examples from other countries, and prefer complete boxes wherever possible. I also always enjoy exchanging information with other collectors and learning new things about our wonderful hobby of phillumeny.

Publications and Web sites

I write articles for the Match Label News, which is the journal of the British Matchbox Label and Bookmatch Society, and have also developed two web sites which focus on specific aspects of my collection :

Old Cornish Mines gross packet label, a few Spanish Inserts

The Old Cornish Mine web site describes the history of the series which first got me interested in collecting, and shows illustrations of all the labels known to have been issued www.old-cornish-mines.co.uk
Spanish Matchbox Inserts (Fototipias) web site is dedicated to the history and beauty of the Insert cards which were issued in Spanish matchboxes between 1897 and 1910 www.inserts.org.uk

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February 17, 2026

Ian Macilwain (UK)

Exhibit : How the humble matchbox shaped my life

Scottish Bluebell label 50 x 112 mm, ca. 1961

I am a retired psychiatrist who has devoted retirement to making a series of self-published photobooks on whisky, Romania, walking and cheese making ! My lifelong matchbox collecting started at the age of 12 while waiting for a bus to go to school. My hobby is always in the background and it only takes an unusual box to ignite the fire! (not literally)

I was propelled into collecting labels at the age of 12 when, leaning over a fence waiting for the school bus I set eyes on a box of Scottish Bluebell which attracted my attention (I was in Hampshire and this was a rare label to me probably dropped by a soldier, as it was an Army camp). My friend who was with me wanted it for his collection but I decided somewhat selfishly that it would make a good start to mine !!

I joined the BML&BS in 1970 and was a member for ten years, lapsing when I had a wife and children. I specialised in Eastern Europe and had many collector pen pals in The DDR, Czechoslovakia and Poland.

The hobby has never lost its allure and now that I am retired I am revisiting the fantastic archive which the collection had become. Every label carries a story and is like a time capsule to my childhood years.

Maybe with advancing years I will re-find the fascination that I used to have for this unusual hobby. Somewhat ironically I have lived in Scotland for half my life surrounded by more Scottish Bluebells than I would care to count.

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February 21, 2026

Ad Jansen (Netherlands)

Exhibits : Netherlands match industry, Nursery Land series

I was born in 1944 and started collecting matchbox labels on the 15^th of August 1955. The reason was that a niece of mine had spent a holiday that year in Sweden. At that time you could get their labels of the Red Cross that were issued by Swedish Match. She showed me the labels she had bought and was so attracted that I started collecting. I went on the street the same day and found 35 boxes. I was very lucky that my father was also a collector and from day one he supported me.

The growth of my collection was very quick and gradually I started to also become interested in the history of matchmaking and their industry. This was backed by the fact that I was in my professional life a management consultant.

When I exhibited in 1971 a small part of my collection a famous Dutch collector offered me his collection. That year I bought it. He had a wonderful world-wide collection. It was so big that I decided to sell off all the labels with exception of the Dutch, Belgium, Swedish and Norwegian ones, and I sold the rest to Axel Winner. We remained friends for the rest of his life and bought together an enormous number of collections from all over the world.

Up to this day I work on my collection every day and still can learn a lot. The match industry is a very complicated one but gradually we all start to understand more and more about it.

What is sad is that we have lost so many fantastic collectors who laid the basis of what we know now. I am very lucky that I have known a lot of them, even ones who started collecting in the 1920’s.

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