Golden Volume II 2026 was exclusively presented to the international collecting community at PIM 2026, held at the Parco Culturale Le Serre in Grugliasco on April 17–19, 2026. A publication years in the making, Golden Volume II 2026 fills a significant gap in the documentation of Italian phonecards, covering categories that existing catalogs have consistently under-represented or ignored entirely.
It is the companion volume to Golden 2025, and together the two publications constitute a comprehensive encyclopedia of Italian telephone card production, covering the full spectrum of issues from the most common to the most specialized. For any serious collector of Italian phonecards, having both volumes side by side means having a complete reference for the sector.
Article Contents
Four WPC Club Members, One Exceptional Catalog
Golden Volume II 2026 is the work of four WPC Club members: Antonio Martino, Andrea Franzoni, Valerio Ghislandi, and Stefano Rossi. Their combined expertise and years of dedicated research form the scientific and documentary backbone of the publication. Each brought a different area of specialization to the project, and the result reflects that depth of coverage throughout every section.
The catalog is also the fruit of contributions from many other WPC Club members, who provided material, data, and analysis for specific sections and categories. This collective dimension is central to what Golden Volume II 2026 represents: not just a scholarly achievement, but a genuine community project made possible by the knowledge network that the WPC Club has built.
What Golden Volume II 2026 Documents
The second volume focuses deliberately on the categories most underserved by existing Italian phonecard literature. Test cards, prototypes, proofs, and trial issues are documented in depth, alongside special-use phonecards issued for the press, NATO bases, Parliament, hospitals, and other institutional contexts. Telephone credit cards and Internet access cards each have dedicated sections, as do phonecards issued by San Marino and the Vatican.
A substantial portion of the catalog covers the companies that entered the Italian telephone market following sector liberalization: Infostrada, Albacom, Tiscali, Noicom, Adriacom, ATW, RSLCom, Intelcom, Westel, TCP, and Arcard, among others. These issuers represent a period of rapid transformation in Italian telecoms that existing phonecard publications have largely overlooked. Golden Volume II 2026 treats them with the same rigor applied to the better-known issuers.documentary corpus captures a period of great transformation, often overlooked in traditional publications.
A Study Tool Built on Research Rigor
The catalog is designed as a research tool as much as a collector’s reference. Each section is organized around rigorous classification criteria, with technical details, precise descriptions, and careful attention to variants and rarities. The level of documentation reflects direct handling and study of the cards described, rather than reliance on secondary sources.
This approach sets the publication apart from earlier works on Italian phonecards. It applies the same methodological standard to complex and rarely documented categories that other catalogs have reserved only for the most common series, making it a reference that functions across all levels of the hobby.
The Urmet Preface
Golden Volume II 2026 carries a preface by Urmet, one of the most significant companies in the history of Italian telecommunications infrastructure. Urmet’s institutional contribution lends the publication a level of credibility that extends its significance well beyond the collecting community. For a catalog dedicated to Italian telephone cards, the endorsement of a company that played a foundational role in the development of the sector in Italy carries considerable weight.
Completing the Italian Phonecard Encyclopedia
With the two Golden volumes together, collectors have a 360-degree view of Italian telephone card production: Golden 2025 covers the core of the Italian catalog, while Golden Volume II 2026 documents the categories that fall outside it. Side by side, they form a reference that no serious Italian phonecard collection should be without.
A WPC Club Community Achievement
The creation of Golden Volume II 2026 by four WPC Club members, with the support of many others across specific sections, is a concrete example of what the WPC Club makes possible: a global network of collectors that produces work of genuine scholarly value. The exclusive presentation at PIM 2026 placed the catalog in front of the international phonecard collecting community for the first time, and the response confirmed that this level of documentation is precisely what the sector has long needed.
