If you have any sources of information you can provide as a starting point, it would help.  This topic is the first hit in a Google search, with the next two hits being about Freidrich Nietzsche!

  Here are the entire contents of my search file so far:

Displayed, on loan, at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1948
Owned by Anina H. Nitze
http://texts.cdlib.org/view?docId=hb3r29n8f4&doc.view=frames&chunk.id=div00018&toc.depth=1&toc.id=

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00119253.1949.10742804?journalCode=vzde20#.VwVHk_krLcs

I checked the holdings of the Art Institute of Chicago and found they had several prints and drawings donated by her.  None of their holdings include any playing cards.  I haven't done a usual culprits (British Museum, Beineke Library, Sotheby's, and etc...) search yet as I've been somewhat involved in my search for the Krech cards.

Crappity.  The Krech collection was broken up amongst his heirs when he died.  Back to the family tree charts and tracking down his descendants.

I found records of two auctions featuring items from the Krech Collection.  The first, in 1948, was the most promising.  The librarians at The Grolier Club have checked the auction record and found no record of the card sheet.  They're sending me images of the auction catalog.  God bless curators and librarians.

The second auction was in 1970 and the records are in Los Angeles at the Getty Museum.  I'm going to try to get someone to go over and take a look.

In a way I'm hoping this sheet doesn't turn up in the auction records.  Two of the auction houses I've spoken to have told me they won't provide me with any details about sales information so a record of the sheet being auctioned would likely be a dead end.  At least now I can keep searching within the Krech family.

I've done a lot more research on this as I finally start to gear up to print some cards.  I've found that there's no one answer to any of the questions.  Artists used what they used for whatever reasons.  For instance, I've found organic and inorganic reds being used on mass-produced cards.  I've also found binders ranging from egg-whites, to gum-arabic (or other resins), to starch (wheatpaste).  Additionally inks could be water-based or oil-based.  The evidence suggests that professional ink-makers weren't a big thing until the 18th Century and, even then, many card-makers continued to make their own inks.

There are all sorts of recipes for various inks/paints and one find that's recently come to light is a Renaissance book in which the artist described all the colors available to artists of the time.  I think that factors that went into deciding which colors to use were:
-Economics.  What can we afford.
-Aesthetics.  What makes our product look good.
-Technology.  What are we capable of making.  What will last on the paper we're using.

Haven't given up on this.  I now probably know more about the family history of the descendants of Alvin W. Krech than they do.   Given what I've found I believe the sheet of cards is either still in the possession of the family or somewhere in the collections of Yale University.  If it still exists.

Shepard Krech, the oldest son of Alvin W. Krech, died in 1969.  At that time Yale University acquired a collection of books illustrated by George Cruikshank.  Alvin Krech was a noted collector of Cruikshank's work.  This indicates to me the collection was probably kept together after Alvin's death in 1928 and broken up in 1969 when Shepard died.  It's possible the collection was broken up earlier as the family sold two leaves from a Gutenberg Catholicon in 1939 and they were also in the habit of donating to museums.

I've written to a couple of Shepard's descendants asking if they know what happened to the sheet but haven't heard anything back.  I'm hopeful I'll hear something in a few weeks.  Realistically I'm going to hear silence, but hope springs eternal.

I liked the burgundy border but it's not practical because the edges of the cards will be white.  I think your back design is period-appropriate but as Don points out it will not play well with modern card buyers.  You should, at least, put a white border around the design for the card backs or accept that some people will be turned off by your design.

I just came back from the Fournier museum. They didn't have the original Ambras cards but a reproduction. They are enormous, basically the size of those jumbo cards. I can't see anyone playing with them in any time period. It must have been an art deck.

While that's possibly true, it's risky assigning modern values to medievals.  Conspicuous consumption was a trait of the ultra-rich then as now.  It's entirely possible those cards were meant to be played with and, if they were damaged or destroyed in the process, that just showed how wealthy their owner was.

In the 15th Century some makers began putting the year the deck was produced, and sometimes the location the deck was produced at, on some of their cards.

You can also go old school and use block-printing and stencil or hand-painting techniques to make your cards.  Simon Wintle's article on World of Playing Cards is a good place to start for that.

Personally I think getting the design elements right is the hardest part.  Some of that can be taught, some of it can be learned, and some of it just seems to be luck or innate artistic talent.

  This image is a 15th Century printers sheet of a deck of cards sometimes referred to as the 'Censored Deck' on the supposition that the missing court figures were deliberately removed to censor them.  This sheet, the only evidence of this deck, was held by magnate and collector of old documents Mr. Alvin W. Krech.  This sheet was document by W.L. Schreiber in Die Altesten Spielkarten in 1936-ish.  That's the last this sheet was heard of.  I've tried the museums and collections in New York and haven't found any evidence of this.  Some of the Krech collection was broken up for sale but I can't find a record of this sheet being sold.  Some of the Krech collection went to the New York Public Library but I haven't found it there.  There was a Schreiber (female, possibly a descendant of W.L Schreiber?) who made a substantial donation to the Cary Collection at Yale but I haven't found the sheet there either.

I suspect this sheet made its way into a private collection and I'm wondering if anyone knows anything about where it might be?

Thanks.

Not the kind of deck I buy but very visually appealing.  I've passed your kickstarter on to some folks who might be interested.  Congrats on getting funded and good luck.

I was directed to another printer yesterday: Superior Print on Demand.  I took a look at their site and I think I'll be giving them hard look as they are an American business (owned and operated and producing) in the US.  They also, apparently, have an online sales and fulfillment service.  Again, I need to look at it some more.

Nice repro work! Cream ground really gives a more mellow look perfect for older styles of art. The images look intriguing, sorta like a cross between regular playing cards and the Tarot de Marseille, especially in the Leaves and Acorns suits. The arrangement of the leaves and acorns remind me a bit of Ogham.

Regarding the colors, I think they look great. Not too stark, but defined. That's always a problem with doing reproduction works - like, should you stick to the original colors the artist used (which were originally bright and gaudy but faded over time), or should you give it a faded, worn look as a nod to its vintageness.

Thank you.  Adding a 'sepia' look to the paper is always a tough decision.  Too much is simply ridiculous but if there's too little people think the deck doesn't look old enough.  This background is actually meant to reproduce the visual texture of a cheap paper from that time period.  It's also meant to complement the colors.  I'm going to do another version of this deck with a different color scheme and a couple of different court figures which will be done on a white background (which is what the cards would have used new).

Thanks for the complement on the colors.  Finding the green 'hiding' in plain sight amongst the blues was one of those really cool moments I occasionally get when studying history.