Plus Fabric

“How much simple inexpensive pleasure there is to be had in writing, or receiving, a letter on paper so smooth to the pen, so crisp to handle…” so runs some of Spicers advertising copy from 1958. The box pictured above matches the packaging design they used at that time (but could easily be later). By then, Spicers must have been one of the main rivals in the writing paper business to market leaders John Dickinson & Co. ‘Plus Fabric’ survives to this day as a brand for envelopes; as does a wholesaling company who have inherited the Spicers name.

One of the former paper-making concern’s productions was the ca. 1950 sample-book whose cover is shown below, including within it “the majority of the usual writing, printing, wrapping and speciality papers”. Among them are some hand-made sheets with Hodgkinson & Co. watermarks, but, as far as I can tell, there is no ‘Plus Fabric’.