CHINESE NEW YEAR
PLAYING CARDS
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Gianni Di Cesare
Omar Hachem
Henry Postons
Jacob Shier
Project Brief
Design and develop a set of playing cards that uses a historical design era as a theme.
Our Solution
Designing a set of cards that is clear to read while maintaining a consistent theme. The design era chosen was cubism demonstrated through Chinese New Year.
Typography
Gang of Three was the chosen typeface for the deck of cards. This typeface contains script like features which resemble Chinese handwriting. Gang of Three is a free typeface, you can get it here.
Our team felt the numbers didn't match the other characters of the typeface. To fix this issue, the numbers were adjusted to match the overall theme. The black stroke represents the adjustments, the grey represents the original numbers in the typeface.
Colour Scheme
Throughout the course of the project, three colours were used. The black was used for details and outlines on the cards, as well as the dark suits. A Chinese red was chosen for colouring the red suit cards. The yellow was used for colouring the dark suit cards.
Icon Development
On a traditional set of cards, the icon that usually depicts the number on the card is the suit. However, for our deck we decided that a Chinese lantern was more suitable for the card theme.
Face Cards
Face cards predominately have the highest value in most card games, and are usually the most decorative of the cards. It was essential to make use of these cards to highlight the Chinese New Year zodiac animals. The Jack is simulated as the tiger as they both have aggressive and courageous qualities. The Queen resembles the rat as they both are believed to be ambitious and honest. Finally, the King mainly resembles the tiger as both are believed to be intelligent and in charge.
Final Deck
Below you are able to find the final version of the full set of the spades suit.
The Joker
The Joker is often depicted mainly as an entertainer as it dates back to the years of the jester. Jokers are also thought to be mischievous, both characteristics resembles the Chinese Zodiac animal, the monkey.
Thanks for viewing this project, stay tuned for updates and additional projects!
For business/ project inquires please message me;
Jacobshier@gmail.com
