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Pictorial Review: Colorful decks from Legends Playing Card Company

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EndersGame

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LEGENDS PLAYING CARDS: Colorful Decks

While cruising the internet in search of beautiful playing cards, I've kept coming across mention of "Legends Playing Card Company" as a publisher of very high quality playing cards.  The playing cards available from their website features decks that are nothing short of spectacular quality.  Behind the company is Lawrence Sullivan, an American magician based in Hong Kong.  As well as a successful career in magic, he established the Legends Playing Card Company in 2013, applying his pursuit for perfectionism to playing cards.  Legends very own "Legends #852" was an instant success, and from here they went on to produce custom decks of playing cards for high end clients who wanted a quality product.  While they also have some luxury playing card accessories in their catalogue, their main market is in producing custom cards, with a quality that rivals that of US Playing Card Company, and even tries to surpass it.  Lawrence Sullivan conceived the Legends Playing Card Company as his answer to the frustration experienced with many "premium" brands of playing cards, many of which were poorly cut and sub-par quality.  He's committed to quality in design, details, paper, finish, and manufacturing, using a proven factory in Taiwan to bring his vision to reality.  In this review, I will show you some of what I consider to be their colorful decks that I own myself and have first-hand experience with, and I will give you a pictorial overview of them.



ROME: ANTONY & CAESAR PLAYING CARDS

The Rome: Antony deck and the Rome Caesar deck is a pair of decks from Randy Butterfield and Midnight Cards.  In over five years of designing cards, he's wanted to tackle the theme of Ancient Rome for some time, and this is the result after nearly a year of hard work.

The tuck boxes are red (Caesar deck) and blue (Antony deck), and have gold foil accents, Caesar's deck featuring an imperial Eagle, and Antony's featuring a majestic Lion.  The reverse side has a laurel wreath and the SPQR designation.  As an added luxurious touch, some of the decks were provided with limited edition "toga sleeves", which looks very stylish and original, and of course it's a lovely thematic touch for these decks!



Both tuck boxes have Latin text on the very top.  Caesar's says ALEA IACTA EST and VENI VIDI VICI ("The die is cast" and "I came, I saw, I conquered"), while Antony's says TARUM ET CLAMA DIMIT CANIBUS QUATIT ("Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war".) I love it when designers add small details like this!



These two decks focus on a very specific part of Rome's history, namely the First and Second Triumvirates. The First Triumvirate ended when Julius Caesar defeated Pompey the Great and became Dictator, before being assassinated by members of the Senate. The Second Triumvirate ended when Octavian defeated Mark Antony & Cleopatra, and eventually became the first Emperor of Rome under the new title Augustus.

The card backs have artwork that depicts the death of Julius Caesar and the death of Marc Antony respectively.



The court cards depict a dozen of the most influential men and women from the end of the Roman republic, including Cicero, Cleopatra, Mark Antony, Marcus Brutus, Servilia Caepionis, Julius Caesar, Cassius, Octavia Minor, Pompey the Great, Marcus Agrippa, Livia Drusilla and Augustus.  The rich and vibrant colours are a deliberate choice, because they are the kinds of colours associated with ancient Rome.

But the attention to detail doesn't end there.  The Court cards all have a facial likeness referenced from actual ancient statues!  The character's name is also to be found in tiny print somewhere on the card.  Just, wow!


 
The orientation of the pips on the number cards is designed to be a set-up reminiscent of opposing soldiers.  Each card's Roman numeral equivalent is subtly added somewhere on the map, as is the text of the number and suit.



The Aces each contain the suit pip wrapped in a laurel wreath.  LEG XIII refers to Julius Caesar's 13th Twin Legion, which was one of his key legions in the Gaul and Civil Wars, and with which he famously crossed the Rubicon in 49 BC.



It's hard to imagine more that could be done to make a deck look absolutely perfect in every way!



These decks are really fantastic, with luxurious all-round look, beautiful card backs (which lend themselves particularly well to cardistry), stylish tuck boxes, striking colours, and wonderful attention to detail including touches of gold in the right places.

BOWL-A-RAMA PLAYING CARDS

The Bowl-a-rama Playing Cards is another clever deck by Randy Butterfield.  Produced under his label Midnight Cards, it combines two unlikely allies: playing cards and 10-pin bowling.

Several editions of the Bowl-a-rama deck were produced, the two main ones being Red (entitled "Bowling the Midnight Oil" ) and Black (entitled "Four Butterfields of the Apocalypse" ).  To my knowledge, only around 1000 of each were produced. The artwork uses the cool retro vibe of the '50s and '60s, including a Bowl-a-rama logo inspired by bowling alley signs.



The Numbers Cards emulate the look of an overhead view of a Bowling Pins setup, with the pips arranged in different scoring leaves. This makes them extremely unique and thematic!



The court cards for the Bowl-A-Rama Decks are characters dressed up in their favorite Bowling attire.





Each Number Card has a unique Team Name towards the top. In the world of bowling, players often come up with creative and clever team names, and many humorous ones are featured in this deck.  Most of the team names Randy chose are found in actual Bowling Alleys around the world, while about a quarter of them are names he made up or somehow reference his personal life.  Randy grew up bowling in leagues with his three brothers, and it is this personal experience that he brought to the designing table with this deck.



Both the Rome decks and the Bowl-a-rama decks were designed by Randy Butterfield, and in the future I will be posting a separate feature article that introduces Randy and his company Midnight Cards, and an overview of all the wonderful decks he has created.

CONCLUSION

For most people, the benchmark of quality is a deck produced by US Playing Card Company.  However in my opinion Lawrence Sullivan and Legends Playing Cards Company have come up with a solid process that is a quality that rivals and in some respects exceeds that of the USPCC decks, especially in terms of the cut.  Reviews of the Legends' playing cards bear this out, and are consistently very positive, and this mirrors my own experience with these playing cards.  While the card stock seems somewhat thinner than Bicycle stock, the cards are very durable, and have a great snap and handling.  The printing is precise and crisp, and not only does Legends Playing Card Company assist designers in bringing their dreams to fulfilment, they also have a very wide range of creative and custom decks available for sale on their website.

Legends might not be going the way of the majority by opting to use a factory in Taiwan, but it seems obvious that their choice isn't coming at the cost of quality.  If you're looking for a quality publisher for a custom deck of playing cards in larger quantities, they have the experience and expertise to meet your needs. But even if you're just a gamer or card collector like me, it's well worth a look to check out their website, and see if they have a deck of playing cards that is just right for you. The decks you see here in this review are fine examples of the legendary playing cards that this company is producing, and they are quickly becoming a legend of their own!

To learn more, head here:

Official website: http://legendsplayingcards.com
Online catalogue: https://legendsplayingcards.com/collections/playing-cards

« Last Edit: April 22, 2017, 08:24:40 PM by EndersGame »
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