GRAPHIC designer Mike Dempsey looked to the countryside for his latest project creating new stamps for the Royal Mail.

Wild plants threatened by farming practices, development and pollution feature on 10 new stamps Osmington-based Mike has designed.

The set, due out on May 19 to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, form part of the Royal Mail’s Action For Species series.

Mike, who has been a graphic designer for over 40 years, was commissioned to come up with designs for a set on the theme of endangered plants of the British Isles.

Because endangered plants cannot be picked he ruled out getting a photographer to take pictures and instead set about looking for illustrations.

He researched the topic meticulously, spending time in libraries including the Royal Horticultural Society’s Lindley Library, the National History Museum and Kew, before selecting original nineteenth century plates produced by illustrators for collection and identification purposes.

Despite their threatened status, the 10 plants selected represent a degree of recent conservation success including the round-headed leek first discovered in 1847 which has since been introduced in a very few, scattered locations.

Mike explained he made some slight adjustments to the illustrations but otherwise they appear as the original drawings.

He added: “I had to select 10 but there are obviously many more endangered plants.

“I had to think about the photogenic quality and whether the illustration would stand up to enormous reduction.

“I also had to have variety. They have their own individuality so you have to make sure it all balances.

“Plus we’re talking about the British Isles so I had to have a good geographical spread.

“What appears to be a simple task is actually multi-faceted and complicated.

“I was back and forth to Kew and had to have it all double-checked by experts.”

Mike, 64, who founded the design consultancy CDT in 1979 and now runs Studio Dempsey, has created everything from stamps to film title sequences and editorial design. His first stamp set commission was in 1980. In 2000 he created a set for each month of the year based on a millennium theme.

He said: “Of course stamp collecting is big business and the Royal Mail realise there’s a market beyond their function. I often get asked by collectors to sign sets because it adds to their value.”