"Cuddly Paddington featured in a selection of 4 adventures — super fun to rub-down onto situation background scenes. 4 titles available."
(Thomas Salter trade catalogue, 1981)
Gravure vs Litho
Although they were originally printed in gravure as GK238 in 1976, the four Paddington Transfer Tales sets were soon reprinted in litho — probably later the same year. But as the following two scans show, the gravure-printed versions were available both with & without the background scenes. The same thing happened with Doodles, which were often obtainable as either "Fun Doodles" (no background) or "Storytime Doodles" (with background). Here, the sheets without backgrounds were just called "rub-down transfers", & the card suggested "simply rub-down onto paper, plastic, pottery, glass and card".
So if you come across a vase decorated with a picture of Mr. Gruber using a magnifying glass — you'll know what happened.
Below, I've provided both sheets from each set set by side; you can easily see that the reprinted transfer sheets used essentially the same artwork, but rearranged on the sheet. However, if you look closely, you'll see that the Litho sheets actually have more transfers than the earlier gravure versions… have fun working out which ones! And note that the gravure sheets have titles which don't always match the card titles…
L55/1 —&— GK238/1: Paddington at the Seaside
L55/2 Paddington's Masterpiece —&— GK238/2 Paddington the Painter
L55/3 Paddington Bakes a Loaf —&— GK238/3 Paddington the Baker
L55/4 Paddington's New Hat —&— GK238/4 Paddington Goes Shopping
