Penny Black printing plates Penny Black printing plates The printing plates for the Penny Black, two pence blue and the VR official were all constructed by Perkins Bacon, the printers of the first postage stamps issued in Great Britain. The construction of these plates was long and complicated, which was intentional so as to make the forgery of the finished article almost impossible. The first stage involved the engraving of a background for the design. This was produced with a rose engine which laid down a circular pattern of symmetrical design onto a piece of soft steel. This was then partly cleared to leave
Two penny blue the penny black and was struck from the same die. It was originally intended that the 2d blue be issued at the same time as the 1d black; the earliest postmark seen on one of these is 6 May 1840. The first issues of this value (intended for double rate letters), were printed from plates 1 and 2. The printing plates were destroyed in 1843. Copies of the stamp are now significantly rarer and more expensive than the Penny Black. Later when the colours of the stamps were being revised, the inks chosen were red-brown for the penny value and