5 Years of the Spacious Tarot (& a sale)

reflections on the deck creator life

Someway, somehow it has been five weird and wonderful years since the deck I co-created with Annie Ruygt, the Spacious Tarot, emerged into the world (incidentally, the deck as well as our Expansion Pack is on sale today through Nov 1 for 25% off so check that out if you’re interested).

Five years of folks all over the world holding the deck in their hands. Five years of managing the whole self-publishing shebang ourselves - navigating the world of printers, warehouses, shipping rates and customer service. Five years of working with the deck myself, continuing to find new layers of meanings in the cards that I hadn’t yet consciously considered when we conceptualized them.

And really, the story goes back even further. Because it took us three years to create the deck before it was released. So all told, the Spacious Tarot has been in my life for eight years now. Let’s reflect…

The creation years (2016-2019)

One rainy day in 2016 I was out for a walk and began fantasizing about creating a tarot deck. A few elusive images came into my mind (one being similar to what ended up as our Six of Swords). Annie & I had met online a few years earlier when she reached out and offered to create some art for my website. I knew right away she was the artist I’d want to collaborate with on a tarot deck.

But because I am an epic procrastinator, I let the idea of creating a deck remain nothing but a daydream for some time. So what happened next was a necessary synchronicity. Annie reached out to ME and proposed the idea of creating a deck together. I was like “UMMM I HAD THE SAME IDEA!” It really felt like the Universe wanted this project to happen.

Things unfolded spaciously from there. We spent quite some time creating mood boards and chatting about the overall vibe we’d want the deck to have before we started toying with any imagery. Eventually we got into a groove where I would present Annie with a chicken scratch sketch and a long-winded description of a vision for the card, and she would come back with a polished draft for the image. We’d then reconnect and talk about any further changes before Annie went on to the final illustration.

An example below: my initial sketch for the Hermit, Annie’s first draft, and the finished card:

The theme of the deck took shape organically. I don’t remember a specific decision to take the art in a first-person perspective/immersive direction. It just kind of happened, and once it happened, we liked it and ran with it.

These early years were special because the deck was a secret thing. Annie and I both had other work in the world, things we shared publicly, but at this time the Spacious Tarot was just for us. An intimate, magical, mysterious world that revealed itself to us in its own time.

The first edition years (2019-2020)

Okay, I realize my timeline is a little wobbly but bear with me. Technically, we shared the first public glimpse of the Spacious Tarot in November 2018 with the launch of our Instagram account. We were still finishing the cards at this time but had enough progress that we were excited (and nervous) to share them. To our delight, the images got a fair amount of traction and support. It was an amazing feeling to see other people as enchanted by the cards as we were!

Once we’d seen there was a group of people out there who wanted to support the deck, we started seriously figuring out the logistics of releasing it. First we had to find a printer. That was a huge process to say the least. Then we had to figure out funding - the printer required a minimum order of 500 decks. We hoped we’d be able to sell that many, but it was daunting. We began setting up a Kickstarter in hopes of funding the initial print run.

Our Kickstarter went live in June of 2019. Annie and I lived in separate states, so most of the creation process took place over phone and zoom and emails. But Annie was able to travel to my home as we launched the Kickstarter, so we got to bite our nails and watch the initial activity together. Kickstarter is all or nothing, so we knew if we didn’t reach our funding goal of around $17,000 we wouldn’t be able to print the decks at all.

Well, shiiiiit y’all. The Spacious Tarot was fully funded in just over two hours, and ended up gathering over $73,000 in funding on Kickstarter with 1,041 backers. Five years later and this still amazes me.

At long last our initial print run of 2500 (!!???!) decks arrived to my home. Annie visited once again and we began the chaotic but joyful process of shipping decks to Kickstarter backers and those who pre-ordered from our new website.

Fulfilling Kickstarter orders with feline assistance.

I did all the shipping myself out of my home for the first year and a half of the deck’s release. But eventually it felt quite cumbersome, and we decided to send the next print run of decks (! yes because we sold out of the first 2500!) to a fulfillment center to take over shipping.

It was also in this time frame that we transitioned to the second edition of the Spacious Tarot which was only slightly different from the first: we updated a few cards and added a ribbon to the box.

At first, the move to a fulfillment center was great. But to be completely honest, it ended up being somewhat of a nightmare that we are still dealing with today. While the fulfillment center takes a lot of work off our hands, it has also been extremely expensive and caused many logistical headaches. We’ve reached a point where we frankly need to get our decks out of there. That’s one of the reasons we’re running a 25% off sale Oct 30-Nov 1.

The expansion years (2021-2022)

Once we got into a groove with the release of our tarot deck, we couldn’t help but imagine what else was possible in this realm. Inspired by one of my favorite decks, the Spolia Tarot, we decided to create an Expansion Pack for the Spacious Tarot. Based on a cartomancy system related to tarot called minchiate, our Expansion Pack includes 21 additional cards for the zodiac signs, elements and values.

This new pack was initially set to launch in April 2022, but we encountered a very confusing and complicated printing issue which delayed the launch (and is low-key still haunting us behind the scenes to this day). I shared the entire saga in a video here.

The Expansion Pack was finally released in July 2022 and we now also offer an Expanded Tarot bundle which includes the original tarot deck and the expansion. I also created a blog series sharing ways to use the Expansion Pack here!

The ‘life happens’ years (2022-present)

Annie and I both experienced some major life changes in recent years. Annie got married and had two children. I had a series of traumatic family-related events and cared for my mother through a terminal illness.

Alongside this, we faced our fair share of behind-the-scenes challenges with the decks. Some of these I’ve already mentioned, like the complications with our fulfillment center and the printing issues with the Expansion Pack. On top of all this we’ve also endured our deck being plagiarized relentlessly. Of course, this is not unique to us. As you may know, plagiarism is a huge issue in the tarot world writ-large.

Despite the fact that the past few years have been a lot for both of us, I’ll let you in on a little secret. We started creating an entirely new tarot deck with a completely different vibe to the Spacious Tarot. While the Spacious Tarot is calm and serene, the new deck is surreal and strange. Right now we are not sure if or when our new deck will see the light of day. We had to put it on hold due to everything going on in both of our personal lives. But we both still dream about it, so maybe, just maybe, in years to come, it will make its way into the world.

A while back Annie shared a secret sneak peak of this WIP deck on our blog, but I don’t think many people saw it. Here’s the Fool & the Magician:

Sigh…looking at these again makes me long to return to this project. Maybe, maybe, someday, someday…

The Spacious Future (2024-????)

Here’s where I finally share the bittersweet news. At some point in the near-ish future (whenever we sell out our remaining stock) the Spacious Tarot is going out of print. We hope not forever, but for a while, likely at least a year or more. It’s hard to say exactly how things will plan out, but our rough plan is to eventually issue a third edition of the deck, with a return to doing the shipping in-house. But this will require a lot of shuffling things around (both literally and figuratively) in our business and we aren’t sure right how, when or even if that will happen.

We both love the Spacious Tarot + Expansion beyond words. Creating these decks and seeing your reaction to them has been a joy and an honor. But being a self-published creator ain’t easy. We are optimistic that we can find a way to return to selling the decks but we need to find a way to do it that makes sense from all angles: business, creative, personal.

So…yeah. There it is. Now would be a good time to get a deck (or a back-up, or one for a friend) if you’re interested.

As sad as it is to go out of print (for now), we are also very proud. Five years is a pretty amazing feat for a humble lil indie tarot project. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t wrap this up without showing a little more gratitude to you. Anyone who has supported the Spacious Tarot in any way, anyone who has given generous feedback on the cards, anyone who has shared this space with us. We are immensely grateful as we look back, and as we look forward.

Cheers,

Carrie