Leonard Fryer (designer)

Artwork for a proposed design for a 2d stamp for King George V's 1935 Silver Jubilee attributed to Leonard Fryer. (not adopted)[6]

Fryer joined the printers Waterlow and Sons in 1906 and worked there until his retirement around 1960,[3] producing proposed designs for material to be printed by the firm such as banknotes and stamps,[3] for the British Commonwealth and South and Central American countries with whom Waterlow had a large business. He also produced designs for European and Middle East countries.[7]

As the earliest part of the stamp production process, Fryer's proposed designs were subject to change. Some were rejected completely such as his design[8] for the 1948 stamp to mark the liberation of the Channel Islands, the contract for which went to Harrison and Sons,[9] while others were printed in different colours, at different values, or with design changes.[10] The British Guiana stamp of 1934 showing Stabroek Market, for instance, was originally designed as a $1 stamp in purple[11] but printed as a 12c stamp in orange.[12]

Working in watercolour with the aid of a magnifying glass, Fryer produced a stamp-sized impression of the proposed design. If approved, a larger original was created at a higher level of detail that formed the final artwork from which the stamp would be printed. Often this was by the recess method from a steel engraving as with the British Guiana 12c[12] but other printing methods used included typography as was used for the 1943 Belgian Congo postage due stamps[13] which were produced in five different values and colours to a common design by Fryer.[14]

• 
  1926 1 shilling stamp of Malta[15][16]
• 
  1934 12c stamp of British Guiana[11][12]
• 
  1943 10c postage due stamp of Belgian Congo[13][14]
• 
  1952 1 shilling stamp of the Falkland Islands[17][18]

Fryer also worked freelance as shown by a c. 1910–20 calling card describing him as the designer of "Ornament Bookplates Vignettes" at his "private studio" at 18 Cheapside in the City of London. In 1957 he was trading as Fryer and Scott when he submitted an invoice for expenses incurred in a visit to the Austrian State Bank Note Printing Works.[19]