storing decks to stay flat? do yours bend in storage?

[choirqueer]

My Revelations deck is one of those nightmare ones that didn't come with a box, only that totally-the-wrong-size fake cardboardy box and a little organdy bag that ripped in about five minutes. I rarely take it out so I've kept it in a little drawstring bag, because I just didn't know any better. Well of course I took it out to read a couple weeks ago, and it was slightly warped and totally pissed off. The querent, who had never had a Tarot reading at all before and was one of those "will this work even if I don't really know if I believe in it?" querents -- his wife had brought him -- man, this dude took one look at the cards as I started to lay them out and goes "I...um...I dunno why but, uhhhh...I think maybe I should have picked a different deck after all? Can we start over?" and got really twitchy. And I was like "Yeah...wow, I'm really sorry, I think these cards are mad at me. We'll have to have a talk later" and did his reading with my trusty World Spirit.

My Revelations deck hasn't spoken to me since. At all.

It's been known to be fairly temperamental...it's the only deck I have that absolutely will NOT let me use it for yes/no questions, or even to do a yes/no divination to see whether I'm supposed to use that deck for a certain reading.

 

[rif]

There doesn´t seem to be any logic.

That sums it up! I just got the archeon tarot, which is so heavily laminated the cards are sticking together; I can't imagine it warping with all that coating. But it is! (Just a bit.) My Gilded, three weeks old, is the same. My Universal Waite deck, which is about 15 years old and has been stored with the rest, is perfectly flat.

I think it's a side effect of the medium. Something I never noticed until recently, and probably wouldn't have caught, except that when laying out my Albano cards they were "puffy."

Poor Oliver Danni! But I like the fact that you have a temperamental deck. It gives it real character, at least hearing about it.

 

[choirqueer]

My decks all have interesting personalities! My World Spirit, for instance, wants to read for other people all the time. I pull it out to do one reading and it wants to do eleven, and will start running after people to get them to sit down for readings. I can use it to read for myself, but it really likes reading for other people. And my Healing with the Fairies Oracle, if I've got it sitting nearby when I'm doing a reading with any other deck, as soon as something uncomfortable starts coming up for the querent, the fairies want to jump in and make it all better. If they really like the querent, I'll suddenly find myself with more fairies on the table than cards from the original reading!

And my RW deck...well, I sometimes call that one the "I told you so" deck. ;-)

 

[blackairplane]

Bending is caused by many things, but mostly it is how moisture works on the paper in the deck. It changes due to paper lamination and whether coatings have been applied to one or both sides of cards, and even the grain of paper being possibly different in paper laminated cards. Stuff moves around according to how the moisture around the card or in the card reacts to its stored temp.
The only real way to assure that your cards dont bend is to store them in a little press- like a leaf press or flower press or book binders press with sheets of acid free uncoated paper placed between each card- but that is sort of anal isn't it?
Let em bend- in antique dealers lingo- its patina- and thats a good thing.

 

[avalonian]

My Haindl deck is flat when I take it out of the box, then goes bendy when I shuffle it. It's the weirdest bend as well, sort of twisty and from top right to bottom left.

I think I shall have to give it the Umbrae treatment.

 

[FaireMaiden]

You need to stand them on end, just like how record albums need to be stored to prevent warping. As well, they should be in a bookcase, or some kind of shelving unit and, as someone has mentioned previously, crammed as tightly together as possible, but not so tightly that the boxes suffer any crushing.

 

[Astraea Aurora]

I'm sorry if I may sound rude to you ... but why on earth do you worry about your cards bending? I mean, it's nothing serious as long as you still have all 78 cards in the deck and you know what you're doing. They are bending, I say fine, let them bend. It simply shows that you're using them and loving them.

Another aspect: Why should I care if my sitter likes the way my decks are bending? I know he/she should be comfortable and relax and all. But should he/she tell me what kind of deck I should use just because he feels uncomfortable looking at my trusty, old, bending deck? Shouldn't it be the other way round, that he/she trusts me to use a deck I know well enough to give him/her a qualified answer to his question? It's the message that's important, not the looks.

I definately see why the bending question is important to you if you collect decks for their historical value or art reasons, or whatever. You collect them and you want them to stay pristine and hot off the press and perfect. I understand.

Astraea Aurora

 

[Le Fanu]

Just bumping this as it may be where I can get an answer to a query...

I have found a very nice, deep box which would be just perfect for storing decks in by the bed. And what's more, all my favourite decks fit in. Only one problem; they fit in best vertically so they're not lying down flat. It is very practical as I can see at a glance which deck is which, whereas if they're all lying on top of one another I have to rummage to the bottom to find the one I'm looking for. So imagine, a nice tall compact box with all my bagged decks standing on end leaning up against each other. They are not tightly packed together á la sardines but are just all comfortably up against each other.

My question; if you store decks in this way (i.e upright - rather than lying down - in bags but not cramped together) do they have a tendency to warp? I'd rather know now than later so I can rethink my storage if I have to! House not damp that I know of so no worries there. The box has no lid so I have a nice skull cloth spread over to protect from dust.

 

[Dusk Till Dawn]

I had my Kingdom within Deck stored like that and it warped. Ever since then, the Decks in bags lay Flat, and the ones in Boxes stay upright.

 

[Le Fanu]

I had my Kingdom within Deck stored like that and it warped. Ever since then, the Decks in bags lay Flat, and the ones in Boxes stay upright.

Yikes! Worrying... Did you get it back to how it was after a while stored flat?