This tarot is another reworking of the Rider-Waite deck designed by Pamela Colman Smith; yet it is refreshing, attractive, and different enough that I felt it deserved its own review, and not be included with the rest of the Rider-Waite clones.

The original designs of the Rider-Waite have been taken and reduced to about three inches high and an inch and a half wide, and set in the center of the card.  The borders have been all filled in with swirly designs and give a windowbox sort of look to them, as if the reader is peering at the Rider card through a sort of rectangular opening.

There is a strong resemblance of the swirly designs on the sides to vibrational medicine artwork, however this is not explained in the little white booklet so I may have come up with that as my own observation.  Many of the swirly designs incorporate bits of the Rider design into their swirls.  For example, the Queen of Wands, in the swirls there are elements which if you look closely enough you can see are the little teensy weensy Queen being twisted and turned all over the card design.

There is the standard number of 78 cards in the deck.  The same suits (Wands, Cups, Swords and Pentacles) are used as in the original Rider, and the courts remain King, Queen, Knight and Page.  Stylized Roman numerals replace the hand-drawn numbers on the original cards.

The cards are standard-sized and shuffle easily.  Even the box design is lovely.  The small renditions of the Rider-Waite images in the center of the cards have had the backgrounds recolored to show gradient light as in sunsets, night skies with stars, etc.  There is a warmth to them that is somewhat lost in other Rider-Waite clones.  The only drawback is that the card image itself is so small due to the style.

Overall I recommend this deck for someone who likes the Rider-Waite imagery.  That is important.  You aren't going to start liking it here if you hated it previously.  However, if you always liked the R-W cards but just wanted a little bit more, this might just be it.  Very beautifully done.

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Review Copyright 1998 by Gina M. Pace
 
Diamond Tarot Deck by Marie-Louise Bergoint and Klaus Holitzka
published by AGM AGMuller
ISBN 3905219204