Awesome Playing Cards

Inspired by an early 20th-century project in which artists predicted the future, Playing Arts invited dozens of artists to do the same for the year 2120. The unique and colorful images come printed on premium playing cards and work in concert with an augmented reality app to bring some of the designs to life. View all card designs here.

This updated version of Jackson Robinson’s currency-inspired Federal 52 playing cards includes a mix of the artist’s favorite court card designs and artwork from previous special edition decks. We absolutely love the engraved look of the imagery, which includes Jokers that form a scene of Washington crossing the Delaware.

Chris Ramsay spends most of his time checking out the world’s most beautiful and complex puzzles. But in this clip, he takes a moment to get up close with a century-old Gambler’s Holdout, a device used to cheat in card games by hiding extra cards up the cheater’s sleeve.

Artist Richard McGuire designed this unique deck of playing cards, featuring minimalistic, yet expressive illustrations on every card’s front. When viewed in numeric sequence, each suit’s story plays out, with tales of love, money, work, and war. Comes packed in a metal storage tin.

While it’s not as powerful or accurate as Mark Rober’s motorized playing card thrower, Brick Experiment Channel’s version is still pretty sweet, and was built entirely using LEGO components, giving it double the geek cred. Now we want him to build a version that fires cash… or minifigs.

From Bicycle’s Cardistry collection comes a deck with vibrant orange backs and fronts, accented with bold geometric patterns. The non-standard card faces have no pips or numbers, making them great for showing off your flourishes, though useless for playing poker. Their Air-Cushion finish is designed for smooth shuffling.

Elephant’s playing card tech-decks feature custom illustrated fronts and backs inspired by the intricate traces on printed circuit boards. They come in blue, green, white, or our favorite, a premium edition with two-tone foil on its box, and gold and silver metallic inks.

This playful deck of cards is perfect for lovers of instant ramen. Each deck comes packed in a resealable bag inspired by the cheap but tasty dormroom staple, while the cards themselves have a noodle pattern on back and on the suit symbols. Look closely and you’ll see the court slurping some ramen too.

Specialty playing card maker Kings Wild Project designed this deck that’s inspired by the look of vintage mail and postage stamps. Even the tuck box looks like an envelope. We missed out on the limited edition, but the standard edition is still a fantastic looking deck.

This unique deck of playing cards isn’t just fun and games, it’s packed with useful knowledge about photography. Each suit is dedicated to a theme: Spades are camera basics, Hearts are composition, Clubs are technical, and Diamonds are shooting styles. They come with a black back, or a limited-edition Kickstarter green.

Designed by Enrica Martiné, these unique playing cards feature imagery inspired by the traditional mechanical drawing style of blueprints. Each card is printed in an indigo blue with fine white line art, while the face cards, backs, and boxes will have accents of metallic silver ink thanks to already reaching a stretch goal.

MakePlayingCards is showing off a truly unique deck of cards that you can see through. The waterproof plastic cards feature a high-gloss transparent print that produce an embossed effect. Since you can see their values through their backs, you wouldn’t want to play poker with them, but they’re beautiful for cardistry.

Flagrant Agenda teamed up with artist MILTZ to create this stunning deck of cards inspired by the Japanese Edo period. The court cards include famed shogun and other key figures of the period, Aces have seasonal haiku, and symbology abounds. They come in four versions, and you can add on custom minted coins.

Kings Wild Project masterfully makes unique premium playing cards. Among their decks is this series, with a design inspired by VHS tapes. The card backs look like video tapes, their packs look like VHS boxes, while their fronts are a 1980s cyberpunk dream. Sadly, the affordable standard edition has already sold out.

These playful decks from Elephant Playing Cards are covered with images of tiny people (aka “pipmen”) who live among the cards, like a crew building the Ace of Spades, and an old West gunfight on the 2 of Clubs. Every time you play, you’ll discover some new detail. Available in white-on-black or black-on-white.

There are professional card throwers out there who can land a playing card on its edge every time. But if you don’t possess those skills, you could always build a mechanical solution, like The Practical Engineer did. His motorized launcher can fire playing cards at speeds nearing 200km/h (or about 124 mph).

Outfitter Bradley Mountain teamed up with 1924us and Art of Play to create this playing card deck that features camping inspired imagery, including hand-drawn face cards, letters, numbers, and suits, along with instructions on how to stay alive using only a playing card. This red version is the 4th in the series of limited-edition decks.

These colorful playing cards are a nice alternative to ordinary red and black decks. Each card features vibrant rainbow colors and dynamic imagery, set against a contrasting background. Choose from day, dusk, or our favorite, night designs.

Art of Play’s limited edition deck features imagery by illustrator Jenny Gebhardt, who provided each of its 54 cards with a uniquely warped and twisted character or scene. Printed by the U.S. Playing Card Co.

Card Experiment’s dramatic decks feature colorful images inspired by traditional Japanese Musha-e woodblock prints. The series of three decks include intricate illustrations of Suikoden warrior figures on their face cards. The Musha cards feature light imagery, while the Goketsu has a darker and more ominous look.

To commemorate the end of the Skywalker saga, premium playing card maker Theory11 presents a duo of official Star Wars decks. Sold in Light Side and Dark Side variants, they feature custom court cards of iconic good or evil characters, and card backs and boxes featuring spaceships of the Rebellion and Empire.

VXD presents a truly unique deck and display case combo. Limited to just 499 pieces, each set includes a deck of Frozen Metal playing cards, a matching anodized aluminum card box, and an acrylic “ice” cube for display. The cards feature wintry holographic patterns which appear as you tilt them in the light.

Theory11 teamed up with illusionist Derren Brown to create this beautifully-detailed deck. Victorian-inspired imagery adorns their fronts and backs, and their green and gold boxes resemble antique books. For a special gift, check out the leather-bound box set, which includes two decks and a letterpressed note from Derren.