serena m. graham

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the hanafuda project:

Hanafuda is a style of playing cards used in Japan and Korea. It has evolved from western style playing cards introduced by Portugese sailors in the sixteenth century. (Read more here.) Each suite represents a month of the year, as noted by a particular botanical motif. Today the cards have become standardized to fairly stylized graphic images. The fun of one of the games that can be played with these cards (the Korean game Go-Stop) inspired me to design a more interesting and eye-catching set of cards.

A complete deck includes 48 cards, as well as several jokers. Below is a sampling of some of these.