The European Interchanges Quartets

When my colleague and I decided to start a business publishing cards, we certainly didn't want to make explicitly children's games like memory games and quartets. But it was only a matter of time before a topic came up that would deserve such a solution, and the trigger was a trip to Italy. Everyone has a navigation system on their phone these days, but we still found ourselves in no man's land in Bolzano - in a truck parking lot inside an intersection. In the evening, calmly, while checking back, the amazement at this Gordian knot in the landscape sparked an interest in interchanges, which was the reason for the creation of this card pack. As "local" patriots, we chose only European solutions, it is clear that the USA, Japan and now even China are definitely ahead with their intersections.

36 cards organized into nine quartets each offer 4 intersections from one European country identified by city and road number. The capital of the given state is always included and the intersections are chosen with regard to their interesting shape. The graphics of the cards are minimal and in addition to the shape of the intersection itself, they also show railway lines and bodies of water. All intersections are drawn to the same scale and the north allows for their orientation.

Above: The European Interchanges Quartets card game published by Counter Clockwise, Czech Republic, 2022. 36 cards + legend in box. The cards shown present the second edition of this deck from 2024, when some intersections and states were replaced.

• See the box

In addition, a card with a legend of the display and a scale for measuring is included. This size comparison card also shows the size of the Great Pyramid of Giza, The Notre-Dame de Paris and the plan of a football pitch. Just as the Tibetans perform their ceremonies by turning prayer wheels, so we, by driving at the permitted speed through these modern shrines, perform our daily libation of a reality that exceeds us. The transcendental experience of the Transportation Age. Go through them all!