Using Old, Valuable or Hard-to-Replace Decks

nisaba

Do you have special decks that you actually use?

Hell, yeah. Several.

Have you had a special deck that you've used and that has lasted well, or have you regretted letting it wear?

My Granny Jones, which is irreplaceable and precious to me, has been used since I bought it in the nineties, and rides around in my handbag subject to movement, jolting and occasional (okay, one) floods from leaky drink bottles. It is barely faded, and not harmed at all. It will long-outlast me.

Use 'em, how can you fully enjoy them without using them?
 

euripides

Use 'em, how can you fully enjoy them without using them?

Right. Next time I get some alone time and breathing space, I'm getting out my Tarot de Paris. :)

I may look for a spare copy.

Re the rare-as-hen's-teeth works-of-art decks: I think with these (the exemplar handpainted RWS; or say, a very old woodblock Marseilles) - they're historical artifacts, not just expensive. So that'd be a different kettle of fish.

As for printing a copy to use - I think it'd still breach copyright, but I think it would be ethically reasonable to do this for a rare deck that you actually owned. I probably wouldn't bother - the look and feel wouldn't be the same - unless it actually was the aforementioned hand printed/painted treasure.
 

Metafizzypop

Right. Next time I get some alone time and breathing space, I'm getting out my Tarot de Paris. :)

I may look for a spare copy.

Which Tarot de Paris do you mean? There's two different decks with that name. One is a historical French deck, with a checkerboard-looking border on the cards. The other is a modern deck, by J. Philip Thomas. Both of them are HTF.

I have the modern one, but I have a hunch you're talking about the historical, which I also wouldn't mind owning.
 

euripides

Which Tarot de Paris do you mean? There's two different decks with that name. One is a historical French deck

Yes, that's the one. It turns out that it's still available at a moderate price - for some reason, I'd imagined it was out of print. It does have square corners, which makes it a little more prone to damage than some.