About This Stamp
Evoking images of romance and elegance, the U.S. Postal Service issues this year's Love stamp featuring a graphic design of satin ribbons that spell out the word “Love” in a graceful, cursive script.
Pieces of ribbon that appear to extend beyond the borders of the stamp broaden the reach of the design and its sentiment.
Like stamps, ribbons often adorn our special packages to friends and family. Attached to floral arrangements, boxes of candy, and gifts of all kinds, ribbons beautify and embellish our gestures of romance, friendship, and caring. Silk, satin, taffeta, and organdy ribbons are often used to enhance the beauty of bridal bouquets and invitations for weddings and other special celebrations for our friends and loved ones. During their Olympic routines, rhythmic gymnasts often use a ribbon to create intricate patterns. While keeping the ribbon in constant motion, the competitors form figure eights, spirals, and other shapes. The sport of rhythmic gymnastics has been an Olympic event since 1984.
Louise Fili designed the stamp, illustrated by Jessica Hische. Derry Noyes was the art director.
The Love Ribbons stamp is being issued as a Forever® stamp in self-adhesive sheets of 20. Forever stamps are always equal in value to the current First-Class Mail one-ounce rate. At the time of issuance, the Love Ribbons stamps are being sold at a price of 45 cents each, or $9.00 per sheet.
Stamp Art Director
Derry Noyes
For more than 40 years Derry Noyes has designed and provided art direction for close to 800 United States postage stamps and stamp products. She holds a bachelor of arts degree from Hampshire College and a master of fine arts degree from Yale University.
Noyes worked as a graphics designer at Beveridge and Associates, a Washington, D.C., firm, until 1979 when she established her own design firm, Derry Noyes Graphics. Her clients have included museums, corporations, foundations, and architectural and educational institutions. Her work has been honored by American Illustration, the Art Directors Club of Metropolitan Washington, Communication Arts, Critique magazine, Graphis, Creativity International, and the Society of Illustrators.
Before becoming an art director for the U.S. Postal Service, she served as a member of the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee from 1981 to 1983.
Noyes is a resident of Washington, D.C.
Stamp Designer
Louise Fili
Designer Louise Fili grew up in New Jersey, the daughter of two schoolteachers from Italy, and fell in love with her parents’ homeland at the age of 16. Her passion for Italian design, typography, and food has informed her career as a designer ever since.
From 1978 to 1989, Fili served as art director of Pantheon Books, where she designed more than 2,000 book jackets. In 1989, she opened Louise Fili Ltd., a design firm specializing in food packaging and restaurant identities. She is the author or co-author of more than 20 books, including Elegantissima, Grafica della Strada, Graphique de la Rue, Scripts, Euro Deco, and Typology.
Fili teaches at New York’s School of Visual Arts and at the school’s Masters Workshop in Rome each summer. In 2004, she was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame. She has also received lifetime achievement awards from both the AIGA and the Type Directors Club.
Fili lives in New York with her husband and co-author, Steven Heller.
Fili’s projects for the U.S. Postal Service® include Love Skywriting (2017), Sealed With Love (2013), and Love Ribbons (2012).
Illustrator
Jessica Hische
Growing up in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, Jessica Hische always knew she wanted to be an artist. Her first professional drawing project was a mural for a restaurant in her hometown. She went on to study graphic and interactive design at the Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia, graduating with a B.F.A. in 2006.
Hische began her career as a graphic designer in Philadelphia before moving to New York City to pursue her passion for illustration. A freelance designer since 2009, her clients have included Penguin Books, The New York Times, American Express, OXFAM America, and McSweeney’s. Hische also worked closely with director Wes Anderson to create the title design and credits for Moonrise Kingdom.
Using color and whimsy, Hische infuses a unique style into her typographical designs. “A friend of mine described it once as ‘equal parts design, typography, illustration, brown sugar, and heavy cream,’” she says. “I create letterform-focused artwork that always has a homemade warmth to it.”
Hische’s projects for the U.S. Postal Service® include Love Skywriting (2017), Forever Hearts (2015), Sealed With Love (2013), and Love Ribbons (2012). She lives in San Francisco with her husband, Russ, and their cats, Billy and Olive.