People mix the two up sometimes, or they ask if one is more “serious” than the other. They are made the same way. The difference is mostly in the decks I start with.

The Inimitable ’26 boards use premium decks that aren’t tied to a specific film or show — Bicycle, Theory 11, the Bourbon ones, the black-and-silver sets, that kind of thing. The cards themselves are relatively neutral, so whatever pattern appears after the shuffle has to come from the arrangement alone. Some of them end up quite stark. Others pick up odd rhythms from the way the suits fell. I don’t add much behind them. The board stays fairly plain so the order can be read clearly.

The Fantasy pieces use the licensed decks — Wicked, Avengers, Star Wars, Peaky Blinders, Wonka. Those cards already carry a lot of colour and character faces. When I shuffle one of those the result is louder straight away. A run of green from the Wicked deck or a cluster of Avengers faces changes the weight of the board before I’ve even finished assembling it. I still don’t rearrange anything. If the jokers land in the middle they stay there. Sometimes I put a light wash behind them (the green on the Wicked ones, for example) just so the cards sit properly, but the sequence itself is untouched.

Both series are strictly one board each. Same size, same hand assembly, same certificate with the exact order listed. Galleries that have seen both usually treat them as part of the same practice rather than two separate things. The Fantasy decks just make the chance element more obvious because the imagery is already familiar. The Inimitable ones ask you to look a bit longer before the pattern settles.

I don’t have a rule about which one I make next. It depends what decks I have in the studio and what feels worth shuffling that week. The method doesn’t change.