A rare, highly collectible tour poster. 26 years on!

26 years ago, the highly acclaimed English band Doves embarked on their UK Winter Tour with their Platinum selling, groundbreaking debut album, Lost Souls.

Opening in Cambridge at the end of October 2000, and closing at London’s Shepherd’s Bush Empire late November, this leg of the band’s tour was accompanied throughout by a hand-printed and blind- embossed Winter Tour poster.

In storage until now, and 26 years later, only 65 of these rare and highly collectible vintage posters remain from the original print run of 250, hand pulled by LW from that cold mill in Manchester’s Longsight district.

A print from this original 250 print run has recently been acquired for the permanent collection of the British Pop Archive.

The floppy disc of Linotype’s Kursivschrift, and subsequent metal plate used to set and emboss the wording ‘Doves Winter Tour’ into the bright white, highly textured fine paper, remain safe on the studio wall.

Archive Condition Tiers

Having been preserved in the studio archive for a quarter of a century, and whilst all in excellent condition, these final 65 original prints are offered across three graded condition tiers:

• Tier 1: Archival Near-Mint: Near perfect corners. The finest copies from the collection. £185.00

• Tier 2: Tour-Grade Excellent: Minor corner softening or tiny creasing (hidden once framed). £160.00

• Tier 3: Authentic Tour-Worn: Corner dents and or edge character, minor face wear from 26 years of tour history. (Majority hidden once framed). £135.00

Packaging & Global Delivery

• Archival Protection: Every print is tissue-wrapped in acid-free paper and safely packed inside an ultra-heavy-duty, thick-walled postal tube to guarantee safe transit. Numbered certificate.

• Worldwide Tracked Shipping: Dispatched from the UK with full tracking and transit insurance.

• Smooth Customs & Taxes: Orders are securely processed, with any customs duty calculations on request — ensuring seamless international delivery with no unexpected fees on arrival.

“It was the early winter of 1999 when I made plans to travel east to the city of Brașov, in the Transylvanian region of Romania.

I left Rotterdam by rail towards Vienna, catching the night train from Budapest to Brașov via Bucharest. Arriving late afternoon in a snow-covered Brașov, I checked into a palatial old Soviet hotel. After spending my first day alone in the room, I ventured out in the evening, stopping at a café before ending up upstairs at a David Lynchian disco, dotted with chaperones wearing what appeared to be white lab coats. I left early and returned to the hotel for a late dinner.

It was past midnight when I left the hotel to photograph the city. The night was pitch-black, terribly cold, and the medieval streets were entirely deserted. Either side of me was flanked by building façades with doorways set just off the narrow pavement.

I set up my tripod in the middle of a cobbled road to capture a frame when the first loud bang rang out from a doorway behind me. A second followed moments later, closer this time. More bangs echoed down alternating sides of the street, edging nearer, until a final slam stopped just several metres ahead of me. It remains the single moment in my life where I have felt absolute, visceral terror. Ahead of me lay the open civic square, where a string of lightbulbs laced their way to a giant Christmas tree at the centre. With a single exposure, the tree was photographed.

In mid-2000, I exhibited a selection bromide photographic prints at Manchester’s Cornerhouse (The Guardian, Pick of the Week). Jimi Goodwin, lead singer of Doves, had originally planned to join part of that European trip and spent a day with me in Rotterdam before I set off. While visiting my Cornerhouse exhibition, Jimi saw the Christmas tree photograph and asked if the band could use it for their upcoming winter tour poster.

I set about designing the artwork, hand-pulling a run of 250 prints from a cold autumn mill in Manchester’s Longsight district. To finish each piece, I set the wording 'Doves Winter Tour' using Linotype’s Kursivschrift and blind-embossed it into the bright white, 300gsm textured fine paper. I then joined the band on the road, selling these posters directly at the merch desk throughout that superb October and November 2000 UK tour.”