Vitrail‒Bridge, 1991

Vitrail‒Bridge playing cards inspired by stained glass, designed by Gertrud Kümpel-Amsler, Zurich, 1991. Although not actually located inside a church window these playing card designs successfully imitate subtle tones of light filtering through coloured glass. To make your own faux-stained glass playing cards you could print images onto high gloss laminate and fix them on the windows!

Above & below: Vitrail‒Bridge playing cards inspired by stained glass, designed by Gertrud Kümpel-Amsler, 1991.

Above: Vitrail‒Bridge playing cards inspired by stained glass, designed by Gertrud Kümpel-Amsler, 1991.

Footnote by Roddy Somerville

I met Gertrud and her husband several times at meetings of Cartophilia Helvetica. They were a delightful, unassuming couple. She was originally asked to create, in stained glass, a Jack, a Queen and a King for the main entrance to AGMüller's offices in Neuhausen am Rheinfall. The project was deemed such a success that she was then asked to design a full pack of 52 cards plus 3 different Jokers. The pack was first issued in the summer of 1991 in a signed and numbered edition of 150 copies. An unnumbered edition followed soon afterwards.