More Playing Card Goodness from Gamblers Warehouse

Playing Cards Dot Net is a division of Gambler's Warehouse, which has been a part of the playing card industry for over two decades. Not only do they sell a massive amount of playing cards, but they are also involved in crowdfunding and producing custom playing cards. Some of their previous projects include the Alloy decks (reviewed here); and the Regal deck, Royal Pulp deck, Double Black deck, Occults deck, Mystique deck, and Spirit II deck (all reviewed here).

In this review series of three articles I'll be covering some of the newest additions to the ranks of the Playing Cards Dot Net produced custom decks. We will meet the serpent inspired Ophidian deck, plus the newest incarnation of the Double Black deck, and we will also make a trip to a steam-punk inspired Wonderland with a grown up Alice!



Alice of Wonderland decks

The Alice of Wonderland decks (available in Gold and Silver) were inspired by the classic Lewis Carroll book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, as well as the Steampunk genre.

With artwork by Juan Solorzano, this project was originally crowdfunded in 2013, and finally brought to life in 2015. Ever since his childhood, Juan was fascinated by fairy tales, and it is this childhood love and passion that helped fuel the artistic vision he had for this project. This is not just another Alice in Wonderland deck, because that's been done several times already. Instead, Juan wanted to continue the story-telling beyond the classic book, by continuing the adventures of Alice further than the original story. In his imagined world, Alice is now a young lady who has earned the title "Alice of Wonderland".

Gold deck

These are two companion decks, but can be purchased separately, so let's begin by taking a look at the Alice of Wonderland Gold deck, which pictures our elegant Alice on the tuck box.



Besides extending the original story, a steampunk Wonderland theme is now the background setting. Here's how Juan explains it: "The original Wonderland story was written and set in the late 1800's Victorian era. The genre of Steampunk derives from that same era so it ties in nicely with the Wonderland theme. However, my deck of Wonderland playing cards is part of a larger picture, one that tells the story of the continuing adventures of Alice. In this more mature setting, Alice is now a young lady and the world she remembers from Wonderland has changed, everything is now Steampunk - but still Wonderland. The 4 main kingdoms of Hearts, Clubs, Spades, and Diamonds, rule Wonderland. "

To evoke this setting, the card backs have gold borders, with yellow and brown being the prominent colours. Hints of the Steampunk theme are evident in the presence of the 1800s style hat and machine-like cogs, while several silhouettes of white rabbits allude to the Wonderland theme.

All the Aces are over-sized and have a watermark style background that harks back to the Steampunk theme, as is evident in the prominent cog shape featured in the Ace of Hearts below.



The card faces employ a yellowed/brown vintage style background, to bring us back to the historical era they depict, and the slightly darker edges give a bordered look that makes them look very classy.

The court cards are particularly delightful, with a very non-conventional colour scheme that employs a soft palette of light pinks, greens and browns. This matches the vintage feel well, and complements the original designs used for the characters. Each suit emphasizes a different shade of green-brown, and depicts characters of a different ethnic background, which helps give each suit its own internal unity.

An unusual feature of these cards is that they only have pips in the indices, and not the usual larger pips besides the characters themselves - although the pips of each suit have also been cleverly incorporated into the artwork of each character multiple times. And if you look carefully, you'll also see a couple of smiley faces disguised in the artwork!



Juan's artistic approach has been has been guided by this approach: "I am keeping the traditional de la Rue design style by only illustrating the face cards and keeping the numbered cards basic, but with a hint of Wonderland."

The pips are quite custom, and are filled with artwork that harks back to the Steampunk Wonderland setting. Aside from these touches, they are unadorned, and very functional.



For the Jokers, this deck takes advantage of the fact that many decks include extra cards. As a result, the Alice of Wonderland playing cards come with three Jokers, so you can take your pick which to use. Included are Jokers featuring the Cheshire Cat, Alice herself, and the White Rabbit. These are individually labelled with character names along the sides of the cards, and unlike the court cards, depict the entire character in a one-way design.



Artist Juan Solorzano certainly has done a fine job of bringing his imagined Steampunk Wonderland to life, and his characters are lively and memorable.

Silver deck

The artwork of the Alice of Wonderland Silver deck matches that of the companion Gold deck, but uses a different colour scheme.



As expected, the card backs now employ a more regal and polished silver look instead of a vintage gold/brown look. Furthermore, the card faces have dispensed with the vintage style background, and gone to an unadorned white, which really makes the grey and black stand out.



The big difference with the Silver deck is noticeable with the card faces, which use the same artwork as the Gold deck, but are now presented in a stark black and white. This emphasizes the drawings themselves, and brings to mind the famous drawings by John Tenniel that accompanied the 1865 edition of Alice in Wonderland.

This impact of the simple black and white colour scheme is particularly noticeable with the court cards, which look exquisite! To ensure clarity and functionality, the pips of the Hearts and Diamonds use the traditional red, and these stand out all the more on the otherwise black-and-white canvas. Besides this change in colour, all the other details in the Silver deck are the same as the Gold deck.



The original plan was for these decks to be printed by USPCC, but there seems to have been some major issues with the fulfilment of the project, and I'm almost certain that the published decks were printed by another publisher, perhaps NPCC. The quality doesn't match usual USPCC standards, and while there is some air-cushion style embossing, it's a smoother and inferior finish that doesn't spread or fan as smoothly as one would like. Somewhat surprisingly, the Silver deck handles noticeably better than the Gold deck, perhaps because there is less ink on the cards. The artwork is nice, but due to the card quality being what it is, I'd recommend these decks more as a novelty item rather than for serious use, although they should be fine for playing card games.

Recommendation

Once again Gambler's Warehouse continues to produce the goods. They have a lot of experience in the custom playing card industry, and offer services as a fulfilment company for many card designers, who rely on their expertise and experience to help produce custom decks. But in addition to helping others make their crowd-funding projects a reality, they also collaborate to produce decks like the examples shown above.

Besides producing playing cards, Gambler's Warehouse also sells them at their online retail outlet. All of the above decks can be purchased at their subsidiary Playingcards.net website, along with a wide range of hundreds of other quality playing cards for sale there, all of which include free US shipping in the price.



Want to learn more?
Gamblers Warehouse: http://gamblerswarehouse.com
Playing Cards Dot Net: http://playingcards.net

Direct links for the decks featured in this review series: (prices listed include free US shipping from playingcards.net)
- Ophidian deck ($16.00)
- Double Black Classic deck ($18.95)
- Double Black Waterproof deck ($14.95)
- Alice of Wonderland Gold deck ($13.95)
- Alice of Wonderland Silver deck ($13.99)