Kickstarter: 7 Questions with Bona Fide Playing Cards of Nouveau Playing Cards

The Nouveau playing cards are inspired by the historical and mythological heroes and heroines traditionally featured in the French playing cards in the 16th century. Created by the team at Bona Fide Playing Cards,  the art style, and design are a tribute to the philosophical and artistic trend Art nouveau, promoted and popularized in France.

The deck has been expertly crafted. Fully custom, the Courts feature historical and mythological characters such as biblical King David, Greek goddess Pallas Athena, Roman leader Julius Caesar, legendary Knight Sir Lancelot, and many more! The suits themselves represent different Social Orders. For example, Spade represents nobility, Hearts the clergy, Diamonds the merchants and Clubs the commoners, and the peasantry.

We had a quick chat with Bona Fide Playing Cards on their design background, the Nouveau deck and their experience on different crowdfunding platforms.

Can you tell us about yourself and what is your creative background?
We’re a team based in Spain and consisting of three siblings aged 28, 26 and 23. Our grandfather was a painter and our father has great skill as well so since young we always enjoyed creating and drawing anything that came to our minds, though we never had further aspirations in the artistic world. As we grew older, studies and work left this hobby in the background until we discovered the fantastic world of custom playing cards and then we decided to give it a try during our free time.

What is your inspiration behind the Nouveau deck? How did you come up with the idea?
Aside from our creative background, we always enjoyed playing cards with our family and friends so we decided to create our own deck after discovering Kickstarter and the vast world of custom playing cards. When we came up with the idea of creating our own custom Bicycle deck, the most important for us was to think of a design with a rich meaning and detailed artwork. From then, deciding on Art Nouveau as our artistic inspiration was pretty easy; we wanted to join the history of playing cards, Bicycle and art all in one. The original playing cards as we know them today are inspired by the designs produced in Rouen, France, back in the 16th century. Those decks were the inspiration behind our court cards and suits. From there, we decided to keep it all French and look for an artistic trend contemporary to the birth of the Bicycle brand: Art nouveau.

Talk to us a bit about going from the first draft to the final version of Nouveau. How did you get to this finished product and how did you get feedback?
The easier part was to design the court cards; all we had to do was to portray in a realistic and Nouveau style the characters we took as a reference. The most difficult was to find the right back for our deck. We took Art nouveau mosaics as a reference and did several tries until we came up with the final design. We asked for feedback on playingcardforum.com and our social profiles; we studied the several options and opinions and finally decided on our current back.

Unfortunately, your indiegogo projects did not get funded. In your postmortem analysis, were there any take-away lessons and how did you improve on things?
As we mentioned before, we’re a team based in Spain. Kickstarter is living a big growth as the leading crowdfunding platform but it has yet to expand to other countries. That’s the reason why we tried the project twice on Indiegogo, though we knew it wasn’t the best choice for a playing cards campaign. That was the first and most important mistake and lesson we learned.

As for everything else, it’s our first deck (and project, for that matter) so every step of the way was a lesson, from the creation to the launch and failure of the project. The most important lesson was to have patience and not to give up, even after failure. We were lucky to find people ready to help us improve our deck and our funding chances. We still have a long way to go but we must say that without their opinions and advices, we wouldn’t have made it this far.

So far, what are the difference have you noticed between Kickstarter and Indiegogo? 
The differences are many and not only noticeable for creators, but for backers as well. The main difference is the audience and orientation of the projects launched on both platforms, making Indiegogo suitable for a much reduced range of campaigns. The only advantage we found on Indiegogo was that it offers its services to creators from all over the world, unlike Kickstarter. 

Another big difference between both platforms was a pretty important headache during our first attempts; Indiegogo immediately charges backers their pledges, with no way of changing the perks they pledged for and no refunds until the end of the campaign. Aside from this, the general running of both sites makes one a leader and the other a mere alternative so it’s obvious for both creators and backers that Kickstarter simply works better.

What are your thoughts about the continuous strong growth of playing card projects? 
As with anything regarding design, custom playing cards offer an infinite variety of possibilities for creators because there are no limits for our imagination, so after the success of the first projects it’s pretty obvious that many will want to give it a try with their own ideas. Another aspect that allows the strong growth of playing card projects is the wide and faithful audience of collectors, magicians and playing card lovers in general. Numbers speak for themselves.

Finally, what are your favorite playing card decks? 
It’s hard to decide on a favorite one, but some of the decks we like the best are Heretic by Requiem team, Seven Seas Playing Cards by Brain Vessel Creative, Muertos by Steve Minty and Sherlock Holmes and Federal 52 by Jackson Robinson. We could keep naming but we’d never end.

Love the art style! Thank you for your time and all the best. If you like what you’ve read here and want to support the team at Bona Fide Playing Cards, you can find the Nouveau deck on Kickstarter here. 


Nouveau will be printed by USPCC and the pledge starts from $15. Add-ons such as uncut sheet, handmade wooden box, art print, T-shirt and hoodie are available. Also, there are multiple rewards that will be unlocked once the project hits their set stretched goals, most notable is the Nouveau Turquoise Edition at $30k.

Kickstarter: Nouveau BIJOUX Playing Cards by Bona Fide Playing Cards

The team at Bona Fide Playing Cards have just launched the follow-up to NOUVEAU Playing Cards, Nouveau BIJOUX on Kickstarter.

Nouveau BIJOUX stays true to the original idea behind the NOUVEAU Playing Cards: A design inspired by the historical and mythological heroes and heroines traditionally featured in the French playing cards since the 16th century.

The art style and design pay tribute to the philosophical and artistic trend Art nouveau, promoted and popularized in France in the late 19th century. On the new design, Karin from Bona Fide Playing Cards explained,

Unlike Nouveau Playing Cards, BIJOUX adds an extra touch to this inspiration with a design that reminds us of the intricate nouveau jewelry. With a redesigned tuck, back, aces, pips and significant changes on the courts, BIJOUX brings the jewelry feel with each and every card. 

Nouveau BIJOUX will be printed by Expert Playing Card Co and pledge starts from €13. Check it out here!

Kickstarter: King’s Game Playing Cards by Bona Fide Playing Cards

The King's Game Playing Cards is Bona Fide Playing Cards' take on the ancient and universal game: Chess. The theme has been done several times by Ellusionist with the Knights deck and recently, Murphy's Magic Queens Playing Cards, but not fully illustrated like the King's Game Playing Cards currently funding on Kickstarter.

Popularized in Europe during the Middle Ages, Chess became a favorite among the higher class and at some point was even used to teach war strategy to nobility and royalty, thus being dubbed as the game of the Kings. With this in mind, designer Karin Yan brought together a deck that aims to represent all the different aspects of chess while adding a regal touch to it.

King’s Game features an entire game set within one deck where the back depicts a globe-like chess board and the different chess pieces are unconventionally distributed among the court cards forming two houses: The Black house represented by Spades and Clubs and the White house represented by Hearts and Diamonds. Karin explained,

With this distribution, I intended to focus my design on the figures that each chess piece represents more than focusing on the pieces themselves. That being said, I also didn’t want to leave out a major factor in a game of chess, which is the number of pieces played by each player and that’s how the unconventional one and two-way court cards were created.

Regardless of the unconventional court cards, the deck was designed to be both artistic and functional at the same time, with standard number cards and clear indices and pips making them perfectly playable.

There are two tucks available in the Kickstarter campaign- The Black game, with gold and black foil, and the White game, with copper and silver foil. The tucks depict two Kings playing a game of chess (one on the front and one on the back).

The King's Game Playing Cards will be printed by the Expert Playing Card Co., and pledge starts at €13 for a single deck. Check it out on Kickstarter here!

If King’s Game is successfully funded, Karin aims to create a follow-up deck depicting the Lewis chessmen and there’s a chance that the chess series will be completed with an oriental Shogi (Japanese chess) inspired deck.

Kickstarter: Alexandre Dumas Classics Playing Cards by Bona fide Playing Cards

Designed by Karin Yan of Bona fide Playing Cards, the Alexandre Dumas Classics' Playing Cards are a tribute to two of the most popular masterpieces by the French Writer: The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.

Fully custom, both decks portray a simple yet detailed image of characters and the stories of each book. Each deck features illustrations of the main characters from the respective book, paying great attention to every single detail.

The Count of Monte Cristo Playing Cards portrays a story of revenge, jealousy, pride, greed and justice.

The court cards represent the main characters of the book, while the back and tuck feature the most characteristic elements of the story with a design inspired by book bindings of the 19th century.

Meanwhile, the Three Musketeers Playing Cards depicts a story of courage, honor, ambition, friendship and treason.

The court cards represent the most meaningful characters of the story and the back and tuck are inspired by book bindings of the 17th century, featuring characteristic and meaningful elements of the story.

Both decks will be printed by the Expert Playing Card Co, on it's Master Finish. Available now on Kickstarter, pledge starts from €13 (~USD$14) and the uncut sheets are available as an add-on.

Kickstarter: NOUVEAU Playing Cards Relaunch

The team at Bona Fide Playing Cards (BFPC) is back on Kickstarter with NOUVEAU Playing Cards after an unsuccessful attempt the first time round. With the campaign ending on April 30th, they are already cruising along nicely toward their goal of $15k.

For the relaunch, several tweaks were made. According to BFPC,

After reviewing all the feedback on our previous project we decided on some changes in order to relaunch with a more professional and realistic product. The main difference is that we'll be printing with EPCC instead of USPCC and it won't be a Bicycle deck anymore. Aside from that, we're starting the project with two editions, without a stretch goal for the Turquoise one. This way we can keep the goal pretty low but offer both editions from the start. There were also some changes done to the artwork which aren't very noticeable but help to improve the final design.  

NOUVEAU is available from $13 and add-ons such as uncut sheets, print posters and wooden box are also available.

Those who like a more simple and minimal style can get the NOUVEAU edition and for those who like a more detailed, classic and colorful style there's NOUVEAU Turquoise edition. Check it out on Kickstarter here!

Deck View: Alexandre Dumas Classics (Three Musketeers Edition) Playing Cards

Masterpiece. Literature. Honor.

Designed by Karin Yan of Bona fide Playing Cards, the Alexandre Dumas Classics’ Playing Cards are a tribute to one of the most popular masterpieces by the French Writer: The Three Musketeers.

The Three Musketeers edition depicts a story of courage, honor, ambition, friendship and treason. Fully custom, the deck portrays a simple yet detailed image of the characters and the story featuring illustrations of the main characters. The court cards represent the most meaningful characters of the story and the back and tuck are inspired by book bindings of the 17th century, featuring characteristic and meaningful elements of the story.

Printed by the Expert Playing Card Co, on Master Finish. Available now from vanishingincmagic.com.

First Look: Nouveau Playing Cards by Bona Fide Playing Cards

[Update] NOUVEAU Playing Cards are now LIVE on Kickstarter!

The 2016 United Cardists annual deck is NOUVEAU by Karin Yan of Bonafide Playing Cards in Barcelona. The NOUVEAU playing cards are inspired by the historical and mythological heroes and heroines traditionally featured in the French playing cards in the 16th century.

The art style and design are a tribute to the philosophical and artistic trend Art nouveau, promoted and popularized in France. As such, Karin's art nouveau deck was picked to carry on the tradition of having a wide variety of styles and artwork for the UC series.

She is the first female artist for the UC annual deck series, as well. She joins a list of world-renowned deck artists who have contributed to our annual deck series, such as Randy Butterfield, Lotrek and Giovanni Meroni.

[Update] NOUVEAU Playing Cards are now LIVE on Kickstarter!

NOUVEAU will be available on Kickstarter 19th September. Don't miss out!

Deck View: King's Game (Black Edition) Playing Cards

Strategy. Functional. Universal.

The King's Game Playing Cards is Bona Fide Playing Cards' take on the ancient and universal game: Chess. Designer Karin Yan brought together a deck that aims to represent all the different aspects of chess while adding a regal touch to it.

King’s Game features an entire game set within one deck where the back depicts a globe-like chess board and the different chess pieces are unconventionally distributed among the court cards forming two houses: The Black house represented by Spades and Clubs and the White house represented by Hearts and Diamonds.

The deck was designed to be both artistic and functional at the same time, with standard number cards and clear indices and pips making them perfectly playable. The King's Game Black Edition comes with gold and black foil tuck box. The tucks depict two Kings playing a game of chess (one on the front and one on the back). Printed by the Expert Playing Card Co.

Available from bonafideplayingcards.com.

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Deck View: King's Game (White Edition) Playing Cards

Strategy. Functional. Universal.

The King's Game Playing Cards is Bona Fide Playing Cards' take on the ancient and universal game: Chess. Designer Karin Yan brought together a deck that aims to represent all the different aspects of chess while adding a regal touch to it.

King’s Game features an entire game set within one deck in black colorway where the back depicts a globe-like chessboard and the different chess pieces are unconventionally distributed among the court cards forming two houses: The Black house represented by Spades and Clubs and the White house represented by Hearts and Diamonds.

The deck was designed to be both artistic and functional at the same time, with standard number cards and clear indices and pips making them perfectly playable. The King's Game White Edition comes with copper and silver foil tuck box. The tucks depict two Kings playing a game of chess (one on the front and one on the back). Printed by the Expert Playing Card Co.

Available from bonafideplayingcards.com.

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