Did you know the first Irish stamp was designed by a Corkman?

JJ Walsh knew it was important for the new country to represent itself as an independent nation and one way of doing that was through the issue of our own stamps. He got permission to overprint King George with Rialtas Sealadach na hEireann - provisional government of Ireland.

5th class student at Saint Michael’s College, Dublin 4, Andrew McNally (11) and letterpress printer Mary Plunkett who with graphic designer Niall McCormack collaborated to produce a limited-edition letterpress print to mark the exhibition and celebrate a century of Irish stamps. Pic: Mark Stedman

Ireland’s first stamp was a simple but powerful statement of its autonomy. 

Economically and logistically crippled by years of war, the new state was too poor to print something unique but needed the world to know we were now free from the shackles of empire.