Tarot Wednesday: The Tarot House Deck

As I continue indulging my tarot card habit collecting beautiful and meaningful decks, I find more and more I am fascinated and drawn to decks released by independent publishers. There's just something extra special about buying a deck from the creator and it feels like 'back in the day' when almost everyone had their own hand-made version of a deck of cards, due to lack of a printing press. I recently ran into a new deck that I just had to feature here, The Tarot House, which is a collaboration between a mother and daughter and employs a combination of Reiki and Tarot.

The Tarot House by Tricia and Jenny House

The passion to create this unique blend of Reiki and Tarot began with the younger member of the team, Jenny, who wanted to bring the intuition and guidance of the Tarot into her Reiki healing sessions to help expand the experience for the people she was helping. Once this decision was made she searched for a deck that fit her needs; something beautiful, positive and created with love and came to the conclusion that the artwork of her mother, Tricia, would make the best possible deck.

Each card has been induvidually painted by Tricia, the meanings described in detail by Jenny and, after four years of work, the finished deck is a beautiful tool.

You can find images and meanings of the Major Arcana, Swords, Wands, Cups and Pentacles on their website, The Tarot House. The deck can be purchased on etsy as well as through their website directly and has recently been reduced to a (more than fair) price of $24.99 (£14.99) that includes a lovely brocade bag (choose from six wonderful colours), a spread card with layouts of Celtic Cross, Past Present and Future and Chakra spreads, a leaflet with short divinitary meanings, and Reiki healing for harmony.

The beautiful artwork is also available as greeting cards from Etsy and ArtistPublishers.

I love a couple of things about this deck.  The images themselves feel so real, I think because they are not digital creations but instead digitized versions of paint and love on a canvas.  I love that the color pallet is bold but not distractingly so.  The texture and details in each of the pictures just add more possibility for a nuanced reading, and I am very jealous of the creative talent required to paint 78 individual images.

Tarot House Spread

In wandering about their website I also came across a spread that I may have to start using as it just looks like an interesting way to have the cards relate to each other, and after all... isn't that what reading cards is all about?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PS: All these images are used with permission from the artist.  Please take a moment to click through and check out her other wares.

PPS: Enter to win a full set of printable BOS pages from a pagan-run small business here.  

PPPS: Enter to win a Tarot Tips Sheet just for spreading the word about a Pagan Publisher here. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tarot Wednesday: Self Published Decks

When I look through my plethora of Tarot and Oracle (and other) decks, I am fascinated by how differently each idea comes across in the art works.  In the age of internet publishing it's easier to find variations from a variety of talented artists, some of which I am happy to share with you today.

The BlueDogRose Tarot by Nakisha is full of beautiful domestic animal images created in ink and watercolor and professionally printed on playing-card stock.  This 2011 deck  is a full 78 cards made up of 22 major and 56 minor arcana.  Swords are represented by Cats, Cups are Birds, Pentacles are Rodents and Clubs are Dogs while the Major Arcana also have goldfish, guinea pigs and rabbits.  I love the vibrancy and personality of this deck!  Check out some of Nakisha's other decks, such as the TaRat, for beautiful are with some standard Tarot imagery.  She can also be found at her blog and facebook page.

The Steampunk Tarot purports to "builds a rusty metal bridge to the edge of your subconscious" and looking at the listing I believe the artist, Charissa Drengsen of curly-cue design, has achieved this.  This digital collage tarot deck is a full 78 cards that blends "post-modern and tribal, ancient and contemporary, traditional and subcultural" images and themes.  The deck is available in multiple sizes and has a large or pocket sized companion book.  I have a soft spot in my hear for steampunk and it looks like this deck does a marvelous job of cohesive digital collage and filling the cards with meaning.  Swing over to the shop and check out some of Charissa's other work as well, such as paper dolls and steampunk patches.  She can alse be found here.

This Oracle Tarot Deck by Lisa Chow is stunning in it's intricate simplicity.  I love the stark contrast of the pen against the paper and I appreciate that she pulls in just a touch of color when it counts.  The artist was drawn in by the classical and intricate art work of the tarot and rose to the challenge of imparting her own spin on the standard imagery and this full 78 card deck is the result.  The prints that color the rest of her shop attest to her artistic eye for color, line and space.  More about Lisa can also be found here.






Thanks so much and please don't forget to enter my current giveaways here and here!

-Kat

Giveaway Tarot(ish) Wednesday - Pagan Publishing Edition

One of the first people I took a successful and thought provoking Tarot Workshop with was the amazing Debbie Chapnick.  Not only does she do an incredible job of explaining and exploring the Tarot, she is also the owner, editor, and everything else at Datura Press that was started in 1999 to publish her Tarot Tip Sheet.

Dolores and Merlin at Tintagel

A few years ago Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki asked a very honored Debbie to act as her archivist. Now most of Debbie's time is spent going though wonderful papers, organizing them, and creating books. These books contain lectures, workshops, rituals and meditations, most of which have not seen the light of day for 40 years. Amongst these papers are not only the work of Dolores, but of W.E. Butler, Gareth Knight, Dion Fortune and the Rev. Robert King.

The reason I am writing today is the company is at a crossroads. People, such as distributors and bookshops worldwide want these books but Datura Press needs enough in stock to fill the need.  They need books and advertising! Currently books are ordered as needed. It keeps things going, but doesn't make much in the way of profit to expand and keep these valuable resources available to the community. Books bought in bulk, however, are less expensive.  Right now books are announced on Facebook by Debbie and through an email mailing list. People hear about these impressive books by deeply respected authors only by word of mouth. Advertising money will help get the word out to a wider audience.

Here's the Breakdown :

• 120 copies of each title (Archives vol 1-6, Rituals Vol 1 & 2, Shadows & Light) comes to $8,504.79. This includes tax and shipping.
• $420 towards the creation of a website with a working store.
• A little over a $1000 towards listing the books at New Leaf Distributors, in all their catalogs and included in their email blasts. Considering they are the largest distributor of New Age/Occult books, it is well worth the expense!

  How You Can Help:

Debbie has set up a fundraising drive on Indie GoGo to raise the money needed to expand Datura Press and make these occult works available to a much wider audience. And there are perks:

• For a $25 donation you will receive a Tarot Tip Sheet:  An eight panel card that is a valuable resource for tarot beginners and experts alike and makes a great teaching tool.
• For a $50 donation you will receive a CD by Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki :   The Mysterious Pleiades was a lecture given by Dolores in Delaware in 2011. Only a handful of people have heard this treasure!
• For a $125 donation you may pick any two books from Datura Press:   There are 6 volumes of Archives and two books of Rituals to choose from.
• For a $200 donation you will receive a one hour Tarot Reading over Skype or phone by Debbie herself.

 

 Other Ways You Can Help:

Tell everyone you think would be interested!  To add to the incentive to share I personally am offering one Tarot Tip Sheet as a giveaway and all you have to do is let people know about this campaign.  Easy entry through the RaffleCopter form below and you can win just by sharing.