"The Hemp Culture Playing Cards"
All Photos, Art Work and Text by LAURENCE CHERNIAK.

ABOVE: The IMAGES of the SET of SUITS which appears on (the front and sides) of the packaging which contain the 1st Edition of (THE CANNABIS CULTURE PLAYING CARDS) and the 2nd Edition entitled (THE HEMP CULTURE PLAYING CARDS). We are delighted and honored to have designed and invented the first deck of casino quality playing cards that is relative the Marijuana, Hashish, Cannabis, Hemp Cultures of the world. Beware of cheap imitations. No one else in the world can honestly make this claim.

Creating a unique SET of SUITS for the SPADES, HEARTS, CLUBS and DIAMONDS was imperative for the sake of well representing a culture that is continually growing in the public eye of society. With the cannabis culture continually receiving this recognition, the rest of the world will someday catch up with Holland, where most of the cards were designed. The logic to this is simply stated since the HIGH TIMES Cannabis Cup which takes place in Nederland, is no longer only tolerated but is now well accepted. To beautifullly depict the photos, in these playing cards, was actually pretty easy when one knows that, (their inspiration comes from one of our spokes, the origin of these photos are from, THE GREAT BOOKS OF HASHISH Trilogies. A very time-consuming, rewarding project.

SPADES: In keeping with the suit of SPADES being the most powereful of the suits we celebrate the entire family of SPADES being consistently the strongest, most powerful images, ranking highest amongst of all the cards. ACE of SPADES in this deck is certainly the most powerful card presenting a reflection of a labor of love in the open palm showing a 1st Quality Royal Nepalese Temple Ball. All 3 Covers photos of the First Volume of THE GREAT BOOKS OF HASHISH Trilogies are a spade card (4, 5 and 6 of SPADES). All the SPADES are heavy cards right up to the KING of SPADES, Ben Dronkers, The other suits in this deck are more fanciful.

HEARTS: Ah, the magic of the Hearts. Starting with the ACE of HEARTS. There is a distinct challenge with the text "WHEEL 'EM 'N DEAL "N DEAL 'EM", the sort of thing gamblers and pirates would say. The mischievous fun continues as well with the TWO of HEARTS where the mask hides a person's true self. The THREE of HEARTS features Kali Sunar, Katmandu's No. 1 Guide, showing off, with him and the rest of several Nepalis posing with balls of 1st Quality Royal Nepalese Hashish which they've just made. There's a story behind every HEART card of how and why they were created the way that they were all the way up to the fabulous QUEEN of HEARTS (invincible Terry Lay) a knock Maui lady if ever there was.

DIAMONDS: The DIAMOND suite design brought a more numerous bladed and a darker leaf to its core. It revels in continuing the inspiration to manifest the leaf inside each of the suites and bring home the idea of this being truly a deck of cards relative to the hemp leaf. Notable cards are ACE of DIAMONDS:........(Balance of this text to be placed by Nov. 20, 2001)

CLUBS: The CLUBS in this deck have been a real pleasure to design notwithstanding that the 6 of CLUBS is also the image (Amsterdam's Central Station) which is on the front of all the packaging and advertising material. Other great cards are The ACE of CLUBS in our TOP 25 MOST PUBLISHED PHOTOS category. First published in The 1980 Marijuana Date Book by AND/OR Press, As well published in the 1983 HIGHTIMES calendar, Volume I, Book 2 of THE GREAT BOOKS OF HASHISH, and most recently in HIGHTIMES magazine in April 2000. TWO of CLUBS: Originally published as the 1st page leading into the Nepalese chapter Volume I, Book 2 of THE GREAT BOOKS OF HASHISH. Page ? Also is in our top 50 MOST PUBLISHED PHOTOS category which includes being on the front cover of HIGHLIFE Magazine (in Nederland), January 1999. THREE of CLUBS: near HELL in the Cayman Islands, FOUR of CLUBS: Microscopic Photo. FIVE of CLUBS: A composition featuring the hashish seen on the title pages of Volume I, Books I and III of THE GREAT BOOKS OF HASHISH along with the top of a verdant plant, in the background. This composition is complimented by the effect of a 5 bladed leaf that is verigated, right up the middle blade of the plate leaf. 10 of CLUBS which spoofs the logo of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police as the Royal Canadian Marijuana Police. Queen of CLUBS (Maria Sabina) King of CLUBS (Napolean Emporer of France).

THE CANNABIS CULTURE PLAYING CARDS and THE HEMP CULTURE PLAYING CARDS display a lovely SET of SUITS that were created with the Strata 3-D. application to help show and put more depth and definition into this important deck of playing cards.

Their gold trim very handsomely displays extra degrees of dedication in the execution of their designs. Each of the suits has a different color for the marijuana leaf emblazoned into each of the SPADES, HEARTS, CLUBS and DIAMONDS in this rich SET of SUITS.

These little touches of additional artistic finesse have earned these elegant and handsome looking, casino quality, CANNABIS CULTURE PLAYING CARDS and THE HEMP CULTURE PLAYING CARDS wonderful comments from all over the world. To see the beginning of posting some of these reviews click here.