~Laura Esquivel
What is phillumeny? A word derived from derived from phil- [Greek for "loving"] + lumen- [Latin for "light"], phillumeny refers to collecting match-related items, such as matchboxes, matchbox labels, matchbooks and so on.
In 1987, the Guinness Book of World Records listed Teiichi Yoshizawa as the top phillumenist with 577,000 matchbox labels. You can see exhibits of Japanese matches and those from overseas at the Japanese Virtual Museum "Match World." Guity Novin has excellent information (and images) about the history of matchboxes.
We have a variety of matchboxes today...non-poisonous, impregnated, car-related, and decorated:
Matchbox and match labels
photo by Takkk
Aeroplane
photo by Stephen Coles
Matchbox with a picture celebrating the wedding of Princess Ingrid and Crown Prince Frederik, 1935
The Victoria
photo by Alf van Beem
Varuboden
photo by Marcus Böckmann https://www.flickr.com/photos/mwboeckmann/2741080544/
Matchbox label
photo by Marcus Böckmann
Mod01908
photo by matchbox minimalist
Matchbox
by dmmalva
La Traviata II
by Roberta Cortese
eBay's Guide to Collecting Matchboxes
ReplyDeleteThese are really cool. Again, wherever people can create some interesting, they do!
The one by dmmalva and the La Traviata II are wonderful.
But I must admit that my favorite is the Aero Plane (non poisonous - non glowing) box.