The history of our era is another of the things that stamps record. One has already been issued to commemorate the Finnish Presidency of the European Union. Among the main issues in 2000 will be a stamp honouring Helsinki, which is celebrating its 450th anniversary in the same year as it is one of the European Cities of Culture . Also associated with Helsinki is a stamp featuring the Suomenlinna sea fortress, which lies just off the city and celebrated its 250th anniversary a couple of years ago. Some of the jewels of Finnish design are featured in a six-stamp booklet.
Nature is the theme on many of the finest Finnish stamps.
Erik Bruun's summer night birds took to flight on stamps issued in May 1999. The theme can be anything, say Mozart's life story as depicted on stamps. A treasure in a collection like that could be a cover postmarked in the city of the composer's birth on the date of that event - without a stamp, naturally, because they had not been invented yet. A Finnish theme collection could be based on, for example, wartime field post material. He is amazed that no one has yet put together a collection on the theme of the Finnish Karelians' fate.