The Rolling Stones did not just soundtrack rock and roll, they gave it a face and a logo. This collection gathers museum-quality poster prints of the band's most defining album covers, from the blues-soaked late sixties to the diamond-hard present. Every sleeve here was a design statement in its own right, and each print restores that artwork at gallery scale.
The Golden Run (1969 to 1972)
The story starts with Let It Bleed, the 1969 record that bridged Brian Jones and Mick Taylor. Its cover, art directed by Robert Brownjohn, stacks a record, a clock, a tyre and a pizza under an absurdly gaudy cake. That cake was baked by Delia Smith, then an unknown cook years before television fame, who was simply told to make it look bright and cheap. It is one of rock's great visual jokes and a striking poster.
Two years later came Sticky Fingers, the first album on the band's own Rolling Stones Records label and the debut of the John Pasche tongue and lips logo. Andy Warhol conceived the cover, a close crop of a jeans-clad waist fitted with a real working zipper. Craig Braun engineered the packaging, and the zipper famously damaged the vinyl in transit until copies were shipped with the pull tugged down.
Then Exile on Main St., the sprawling 1972 double album recorded partly in a French villa basement. Robert Frank built the cover from a grid of black and white photographs, anchored by his 1950 shot of a tattooed sideshow wall on Route 66. Raw, crowded and human, it is a documentary collage that rewards a large format.
Comeback and Reinvention (1978 to 1981)
Some Girls marked Ronnie Wood's first full album and answered punk and disco head on. Peter Corriston designed the elaborate die-cut sleeve, illustrated by Hubert Kretzschmar, dropping the band's faces into a vintage Valmor wig advertisement alongside famous women. Lucille Ball, Raquel Welch, Farrah Fawcett, Liza Minnelli and the Marilyn Monroe estate all objected, forcing a hurried redesign, which makes the original artwork a genuine collector's talking point.
Tattoo You followed in 1981, largely assembled from vault outtakes yet home to Start Me Up. Corriston returned with a striking cover of a face covered in swirling tattoos, and the record became the band's last American number one. Bold and graphic, it is one of the strongest single-image sleeves in the catalogue.
The Modern Stones (2016 to 2023)
Blue and Lonesome sent the band back to their beginning, an all-covers blues album cut in just three days in 2016. It won the Grammy for Best Traditional Blues Album, and its deep blue sleeve suits a quieter wall.
The run closes with Hackney Diamonds, the 2023 comeback that broke an eighteen year silence on original material and won Best Rock Album at the Grammys. Its shattered glass motif nods to London slang for the debris of a smashed window, a fitting emblem for a band still swinging.
Sizes and framing
Each poster prints on heavyweight archival paper in sizes from compact A4 up to statement A1, so you can match a desk nook or a full feature wall. Choose framed for a finished, ready to hang piece, or unframed if you prefer your own moulding. The museum-grade inks hold the deep blacks of Exile and the acid colours of Let It Bleed without fading.
Building a gallery wall
These covers were made to hang together. Run the golden trio of Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers and Exile in a row for a late-sixties statement, or mix eras to trace the band across five decades. Keep frames uniform and spacing tight for a grid, or stagger sizes for a looser salon look. However you arrange them, the tongue logo ties the whole wall to one unmistakable band, and each cover still holds its own as a single hero print.
