About This Stamp
The U.S. Postal Service issues a new stamped card in 2025 featuring a two-masted schooner sailing in open water.
Libby VanderPloeg illustrated the art based on a photo taken by Billy Black of the Columbia schooner, a 2014 replica of the original built in 1923. The artist started with pencil sketches before using Adobe Illustrator to finish the design.
Sailing vessels are identified by their rigs — the shape, number, and arrangement of sails and masts. The boat depicted on the stamped card has a schooner rig, which features fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts. Noted for their speed and versatility, schooners were inspired by 17th-century European designs, with the rig further developed in early 18th-century New England. By the end of that century, it was one of the most important rigs in North America, used for fishing and other coastal trades. Requiring a smaller crew for vessels of their size, schooners handle well in a variety of conditions. Their utility carried schooners into the 20th century, but the advent of reliable marine engines led to their eventual decline in popularity.
Schooners have played an important role in American history. In 1775, the schooner Hannah was the first armed vessel under the Continental Army’s pay and control in the Revolutionary War. In 1851, the New York Yacht Club’s schooner America, which was based on the design of New York Harbor’s fast pilot schooners, beat Britain’s fastest racing yachts in a race around the Isle of Wight. The same cup they won continues to be awarded as the oldest trophy in international sports, now renamed America’s Cup. In 1905, the New York-built Atlantic, a three-masted schooner, won the Kaiser’s Cup and set a record for a monohull crossing the Atlantic Ocean that would stand for 100 years.
Antonio Alcalá art directed the project.
Schooner is being issued as a Forever® stamped card. Its postage will always be equal to the value of the stamped postcard rate in effect at the time of use, even if the price increases after purchase.
Stamp Art Director
Antonio Alcalá
Antonio Alcalá served on the Postmaster General’s Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee from 2010 until 2011, when he left to become an art director for the U.S. Postal Service's stamp development program.
He is founder and co-owner of Studio A, a design practice working with museums and arts institutions. His clients include: the National Gallery of Art, Library of Congress, National Portrait Gallery, National Museum of Women in the Arts, The Phillips Collection, and Smithsonian Institution. He also lectures at colleges including the Corcoran College of Art + Design, SVA, Pratt, and MICA.
In 2008, his work and contributions to the field of graphic design were recognized with his selection as an AIGA Fellow. He has judged international competitions for the Society of Illustrators, American Illustration, AIGA, and Graphis. Alcalá also serves on the Smithsonian National Postal Museum and Poster House Museum’s advisory councils. His designs are represented in the AIGA Design Archives, the National Postal Museum, and the Library of Congress Permanent Collection of Graphic Design.
Alcalá graduated from Yale University with a BA in history and from the Yale School of Art with an MFA in graphic design. He lives with his wife in Alexandria, Virginia.
Stamp Artist, Stamp Designer
Libby VanderPloeg
Illustrator Libby VanderPloeg always loved drawing. Growing up in Grand Haven and Grand Rapids, Michigan, she was surrounded by books and stories, as her mom was a storyteller and children’s librarian.
After studying fine art at University of Illinois at Chicago and working as a graphic designer, art director, and even a cheese monger in Brooklyn, she decided to fully embrace her lifelong love of drawing through illustration.
Her favorite project in her career thus far has been illustrating the book British Museum: A History of the World in 25 Cities. For the book, she illustrated maps of 25 cities at pivotal points in history, as well as vignettes of daily life and historical events.
Her work has also appeared in numerous publications including Better Homes & Gardens, Condé Nast Traveler, The New Yorker, The New York Times, Oprah Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among many others.
VanderPloeg—who describes her own work as whimsical, colorful, bold, and modern—loves creating quirky, sweet, animated gifs that celebrate community and inclusivity. She especially enjoys playing with pattern, and also making colorful, detailed maps.
She currently lives in west Michigan.
VanderPloeg designed and illustrated the 2023 Sailboats postcard stamps and the 2025 Schooner stamped card.