Oswald Wirth, Giordano Berti, Stefano Palumbo
Los Scarabeo, 2008
I bought this deck in 2008 from The Tarot Garden. It was an impulse purchase and I am still trying to figure out if it was a good thing or not. The colors in the deck are extremely pleasing - I do love the muted tones. The Majors are TdM style and the unillustrated pips are pretty illustrated to me. The pips are heavily adorned with astrological symbols and if you look at them long and hard, some of them make sense. And then you have to wrap your head around the Cups as Air and Swords as Water concept. There was a moment where that made complete sense, but then I lost it. I do believe that this is a Spanish School element assignment. And seriously, it did make sense! For a minute. But it slipped away. I have shown the Knight of Swords and the Queen of Cups. 
As a reading deck it caused great frustration. I could "get" the majors, but the pips give me fits. I find them pretty to look at and then I remember I have to give some sort of interpretation of what I see. At that point, I just gibber.All that whining aside, I must say that this deck has value. I can grasp it for a fleeting moment, but during that brief moment it all makes perfect sense. It is a deck that tells me to think outside the tarot box - to explore something different. I would never, ever, under any circumstance recommend this deck to a beginner. I don't even think I'd show it to a beginner. It is confusing and disruptive. A beginner doesn't need to have that kind of stress.
Rating - after careful consideration...a Keeper-.
