Way back in January we gave a heads-up that an excellent sale of rare stamps from three islands was coming to Spink in London, and this has now taken place.

The biggest sellers of the sale were stamps from the Cayman Islands, a small group of British owned islands to the south of Cuba. The three which excited bidders were all 1907-8 provisionals with overprints, all naturally featuring Edward VII.

As we expected, the salmon-pink and green block of two, of which only one of the 5- pieces has the ½ D overprint proved exciting to collectors and investors present, and even beat its £45,000-50,000 estimate to bring £52,000.

Cayman Islands 1907 Pair

Perhaps this is not surprising, since only four examples like this exist, and one of them is in The Royal Philatelic Collection.

However, it was not the biggest sale in the auction. A single salmon and green stamp with the overprint inverted trounced its £30,000-40,000 guide price to bring £64,000.

Likewise, a fresh and fine blue on brown 4 D with ½ D overprint stamp brought £40,000 over an estimate of £18,000-22,000. An indication of the strength of high-quality rarities as tangible investments.

Those interested in collectible stamps will also want to take a look at another very rare stamp bearing the head of Edward VII: this Tyrian Plum is available to buy right now.