The Fantastic Menagerie Tarot — standard deck, second edition with cold-stamping.

The Fantastic Menagerie Tarot was originally published by us in 2006, but has been out of print for many years. After many (many) requests, and as we feel that our ability to add cold-stamping now brings a whole new visual level to the cards, we are making a splendid second edition. Everything is made in Europe as we don't send any files to countries that have a record of counterfeiting. This helps to protect your deck from being copied. 

Please note that we expect this deck to begin shipping late in September 2020. Shipping will take quite some time (we have a lot of orders and also have to limit the number of people in the studio), so your deck may be shipped in October, or even into November. 

All items ordered with a pre-order will be sent at the same time when the deck is available. If you would like to have any items sent earlier, please place them in a separate order.

Lively, humorous and utterly engaging, The Fantastic Menagerie Tarot is based on the illustrations of 19th century French illustrator, J.J. Grandville. Known as the "Father of Surrealism", Grandville was a huge influence on artists such as Tenniel, the first illustrator of Alice in Wonderland (and also a huge influence on Baba Studio of course!). His pictures are cynical, funny, bitter and sweet - and make for a deck that manages to be both timeless and true.

As the deck is in progress the pictures here are mock-ups, though they do give the most accurate impression of the deck that we can manage at this point. The final look may change. If you would like to know exactly how the deck and packaging will look, please wait until we are nearer to September.

There will be cold-stamping (a metallic effect). We have test-printed two of the cards, so that you can see the effect. We will add more images as soon as possible.

• 78 fully-illustrated scenic cards based on Rider Waite Smith (RWS) tarot pattern.
• The cards are a generous size - 128*78mm (about 5 inches by 3 inches).
• Challenging, witty images that invite you to use your imagination and  intuition.
• The images are taken from our original books. Our Les Métamorphoses du Jour book is an original from 1847, with hand-coloured imagery. This helps to give our images their fantastic, detailed quality.
• Painstakingly cold-stamped. We use subtle cold-stamping throughout the whole image - this makes the card "flash" with metallic colours when the light hits it. Please see the individual card pictures (which are our test prints) for how this will look.
• Printed in Europe on high-quality German-made 330 gram playing card stock with a carbon inner layer to protect against bending and creasing.
• Lightly varnished for durability without a plastic feeling - the finish is fairly matte.
• Sturdy hinged box for long-term storage. Please note that as we are now working with a new printer (also in Europe) we do not yet know if it will be possible to put cold-stamping on to the box. We will make sure that the design is beautiful either way. 
• Booklet with meanings and guide for use.

We also have optional items listed separately. These include:

• Extensive and highly-illustrated full companion book (extensively changed for this edition) with coloured card illustrations! There is a pre-order discount available for the book.
• Limited edition Fantastic Managerie Tarot bags — with prints from the cards and with high-quality silk velvet. To get 20% off a bag when ordered with a deck, please enter this code at checkout (only one discount code can be used at checkout): 

  Fantastic20off