Why people dislike vintage/old (unused) cards?

nobody tell you should not send such cards you just send what you have and think person will like. You must not follow people’s preference list at all. Once i hadn’t any suitable postcards but person wanted postcard with a fox, so i painted in on a postcard. Thats it. Just have fun :hugs: :postbox:

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I’m not too fond of most vintage card because of the photo quality (which has improved a lot without any doubt) and - in case of multi view cards - the design style. Of course there are always exceptions and I don’t state something like no vintage on my profile, but turned it the other way round - I wrote that I enjoy modern view cards.

For illustrations: most of vintage style illustration are not my favourite, just from the style perspective (edit: so I don’t like vintage reprints either)

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Some points may be yellowed paper, outdates views, or that very old ones only come in black and white.
I personally find them interesting, but don’t wish for them. I could imagine that people may be more interested in how an area looks today vs how it looked 40/80 years ago.

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As @Nordbaer mentioned before, it’s a matter of taste.

And maybe also because some people (very few) use this to get rid of some really shabby (in this case I don’t mean “shabby-style”) and dirty cards.

I like old and vintage cards but it also happened to me that I got dirty new (produced after 2000) cards.

So maybe some would simply avoid to get “trash”.

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For me personally, I don’t mind yellowed paper and I quite like many of the older (or retro) designs. However, I do agree that the photo quality can be quite poor on many older cards. In general, I would say that I enjoy vintage cards, but I think that I would rather have cards with drawings/art than photos when it comes to vintage. I prefer the higher quality photography featured on modern cards. That said, if there was some special historical moment or place depicted in the picture, I wouldn’t mind the lower photo quality; interest/historical significance trumps photo quality for me. :slight_smile:

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There’s a discussion about this here:

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There are many reasons why vintage cards appear on do not want lists. Being a collector/seller/buyer/trader of postcards for 40+ years, I will give you MY opinion why I don’t prefer them.

First you have to define what “vintage” is. Here in the US, some mean pre-1960. Others pre-1950 and still others pre-1940. For myself, I prefer postcards published after 1990. Why? Primarily because viewcards published earlier than that…the photography can be quite poor. Those published after…the photography is generally much sharper. Also, the majority of these earlier cards, with few exceptions, aren’t identified on the front. For those who keep cards in albums (I don’t) that presents a problem if have pages of cards back to back.

Do Vintage cards have any positives? Most certainly. Again using the US, vintage postcards offer some unique images that you would rarely, if ever, see on a modern postcard. I hope that gives you some idea about this subject.

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I really like the thought of vintage postcards. A couple of the postcards in my stash to potentially send are reprints of vintage cards. I wish they were originals, but the city view from 1920 is pretty remarkable on one of the cards I have. I’m saving them for people who have the like of history/historical in their profiles, figure it fits in that genre :slight_smile:

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I love vintage cards and prefer them to new. The reason lies with my angel in collectings. With vintage I get a time travel to the past in differents fields and topics. Vintage for me is hand coulored or black and white.

I think lies in what color can give as “value added” to black/white = life in true light spectre.

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I really enjoy vintage cards, especially the very early ones (reprints or not), and colourised ones make me especially happy.


This is one I really like.

But I’m less interested in more modern vintage cards :smiley:
After the 60s or so.

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I agree that “vintage” means different things to different people!
I say on my profile that I like to receive vintage cards. Yes, I get some that I am not especially fond of. But the category is so vast and flexible that it offers a chance for serendipity. The surprise is part of the fun. It’s a meta-category that offers lots of scope for unexpected delight.
Very old (antique) cards prior to WW2 are amazing, but usually expensive to buy secondhand, so I do not request those specifically. Those are my favourites, though.

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I’m a historian and University professor so I like vintage, especially linen cards. But some of the photo quality and subject material of pre 1970s cards may not be very good.

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I have the same questions althought people have preferences of every kind of card so vintage is no exeption.
I’ve heard people don’t like the quality but I own cards that are over 30 years old and are in same good condition than brand new ones, so we can’t generalize.

Only valid reason I see people not wanting them is that if they have a smell in them, as old paper sometimes does. As someone sensitive to certain smells and it affects my life, I understand that. Personally I haven’t had problems with that in Postcrossing.

Once I bought over 80 cards from some collector and they all had a very strong smell of scented detergent and attic. I aired them out on a laudry rack for some days and it got better. I keep them in a seperate box.

So the smell can be a problem in other cards too, not just vintage.

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I personally don’t like vintage postcards and that’s my reasons:

  1. Photo quality is usually poor and this really bothers me;
  2. Some of them have photos taken from weird angles;
  3. I prefer photos with bright colors.

But these are just my personal preferences. I’m sure many people don’t agree with me.

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Some older cards look like they were not taken by a photographer, but by someone that fell while holding a camera and clicked by mistake🤣 Like 90% of the card is a crossroad, and any buildings or anything of interest is there practically by chance.
Or they have like lots of flowers in the foreground. Which doesn’t sound like a bad thing, but basically I think a lot of old viewcards are just plain ugly.
The really really vintage ones, like before the 1950s, look to me like really precious instead, and tend to look less embarrassing.

I’m not going to wish not to receive them because I really don’t mind, but I like beautiful views of real places and I find a lot of old cards really not beautiful.

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I don’t mind vintage cards but unfortunately some of them acquire a smell. I don’t know if it’s from just being old or the paper quality. And probably the people sending them don’t even notice the smell.

I wonder how people would feel about getting an old postcard that has been modified by the sender?

Let’s say you have an older card like this one. (I don’t have it, by the way – it’s just a random picture pulled off the Web.)

It’s not very exciting, right?

But if I pasted a picture of Godzilla rampaging over the rooftops…?

I think it could be quite fun to “improve” dull older cards by modifying them with artwork or stickers. Of course, I recognize that some people prefer straight-up postcards, so not everyone would care for that.

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I would love that. Actually, I saw some days ago embroidered old postcards and I found it rather original.

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If you have a small collection of postcards, then that is it. Some countries and the places someone live provide more opportunities to buy or order or have a lot of postcards. Don’t worry too much about it. Try to make the best of the writing part - interesting enough that the image maybe less important…

In the old days before Internet and Postcrossing you bought the postcards and writing paper you liked to send to friends, family and pen pals…

Postcrossing is all about sending and receiving postcards. You’re in charge and all the profiles are preferences, not obligations!

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I love the pre-Godzilla picture! Just goes to show, taste is in the eye of the beholder!

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