Man, if you told me a year ago I’d be spending my weekends pawing through bolts of fabric like some textile expert, I’d have laughed in your face. But here we are. I started trying to make my own decent tarot reading cloths and bags, and finding the right material was an absolute nightmare. The cards need to slide just right, but the fabric can’t slip off the table, and it can’t suck up moisture instantly. It’s a whole science, believe me.
The Early Mistakes: Polyesters and the Shedding Velvet
I kicked off this project thinking, “Fabric is fabric, right?” Wrong. I went straight for the budget options, figuring I could save some cash since I needed big squares of the stuff.
My first haul was cheap polyester satin and some basic, thin cotton muslin. I immediately realized how dumb that was. I cut the cotton and tried a reading. The cards grabbed onto the surface like Velcro. Every time I tried to fan them out or shuffle them around, they clumped up. Totally unusable. The feel was awful too—it just felt like a dish rag.
The polyester satin looked shiny and fancy, so I thought, maybe this is it? I spread it out. First problem: static. The edges of the cloth kept trying to stick together, and when I laid the cards down, the static electricity was making the cards jump slightly. Worse, it slid around the table worse than an oil spill. I spent more time trying to keep the cloth centered than reading the damn cards. Wasted money, first round.
Next up, I tried cheap velvet. Everyone says velvet is the classic tarot fabric, so I bought the cheapest crushed velvet I could find at the big box craft store. It looked great! For about five minutes. I tried sliding a few cards across it, and they did slide nicely, but then I realized the fibers were coming off. This stuff was shedding like a cheap dog. I finished one short reading, and my cards were dusted with tiny blue fuzz. I had to get a lint roller just to clean the deck. That velvet went straight into the trash. Lesson learned: if it’s cheap velvet, skip it.
Moving Up the Quality Ladder: Linen and the Real Satins
I realized I needed to stop being so cheap and focus on quality and drape. I started buying smaller swatches of nicer materials.
I picked up some high-quality linen. This was fantastic for tarot bags—durable, sturdy, and breathable. But for a reading mat? Too stiff. It held wrinkles like crazy, and the texture was still too rough for a smooth card slide. I put the linen aside for just making the drawstring bags instead.
Then I tested proper silk-blend satins. Not the poly garbage, but stuff with some real weight to it. This was getting closer.
- Pro: Excellent card slide. The cards move beautifully.
- Con: Still a bit too slippery on certain tables. More importantly, it shows every single wrinkle and fold. If you stuff the mat in a bag, you have to iron it before the next use, which is a major hassle when you’re out and about.
I moved on to experimenting with heavier fabrics—brocade and jacquard. These looked gorgeous, but they were too thick. The cards didn’t lie flat; the texture was distracting. Plus, they were expensive and the cleaning was a nightmare. This was too much effort for a simple reading cloth.
The Ultimate Winner: Suede and High-Quality Velour
After dumping cash on about seven different failed materials, I finally landed on the winners. And they weren’t what I expected.
For the reading mat itself, especially for travel, microfiber suede is unbeatable. It looks and feels like real suede, but it’s lighter, thinner, and machine washable. Crucially, the back surface has a slight grip, so it doesn’t slide all over the table, but the front surface is super smooth, allowing the cards to glide. I bought some in a darker color, and it’s perfect. It folds up nicely without holding deep creases. This was the first material that solved all three problems: slide, grip, and maintenance.
The second winner, if you absolutely must have velvet, is a heavyweight cotton velour or true upholstery velvet. This is the stuff that costs $20 a yard or more. It has a high pile, but it’s tightly woven so it doesn’t shed. The weight makes it drape perfectly. If I’m doing a home reading where I don’t need to fold it up, this is my go-to. I finally found something luxurious that actually works.
Why I Got So Pissed Off About Fabric Weave
So why did I end up dedicating weeks of my life and a couple hundred bucks just to figure out what damn fabric to use? I mean, who cares this much?
Well, I didn’t care until I was doing a reading for a friend at a coffee shop one rainy afternoon. I had brought my favorite deck—an expensive, limited-edition deck that cost me a fortune and took forever to track down. I was using one of those early, cheap cotton cloths I thought was “good enough.”
My friend accidentally tipped her tea cup. Just a tiny amount, but it hit the cloth. Because the cotton was thin and loosely woven, it acted like a sponge and wicked that moisture straight through. I literally watched the stain spread across the cloth and right into the corner of my deck, warping about four cards instantly. Four perfectly good, hard-to-replace cards, ruined because I skimped on the mat.
I was so pissed off, you have no idea. That was the moment I realized the reading cloth isn’t just decoration; it’s protection. It has to act as a barrier. The thought of ruining another deck because of a crappy piece of fabric drove me nuts. I literally went home, dumped all my cheap scraps, and started researching textile water resistance and fiber density. I talked to friends who sew professionally. I spent hours online reading reviews about drapery fabric. My wife thought I was losing it.
That one ruined deck meant I had to start over. I ended up having to buy an entirely new deck set just to replace those four damaged cards, and that cost way more than investing in high-quality suede did in the first place. That’s why I know precisely which tarot fabric is best—because I learned the hard way what the cheap stuff costs you in the end. Save yourself the headache; skip the cotton and the poly, and just go straight for the heavyweight velour or the microfiber suede.
