Maybe it's because I was lucky enough to have beautifully illustrated fairy tale collections when I was a child. An old book with illustrations by Paul Hey and the cutely-too-cute Felicitas Kuhn, Marlene Reidel and later, when my children were young, magical Lisbeth Zwerger...
Oh, I looked for pictures to add to this post, and I find I have to write something about each of them, and will maybe remember more!
Paul Hey - his pictures were collected eagerly by the generation of my parents, if they had parents that smoked. My mother remembers that her father was a heavy smoker, and she and her siblings were eager for the fairy tale cards in each pack of cigarettes he bought. They bought the book and filled it, and it's a beautiful book in spite of its lowly origin.
Paul Hey, illustration for the Seven Swans
Hey was a respected commercial artist with a solid academic training. He worked in gouache in a neo-Biedermeier style that suited the fairy tales very well. He was active in the 1920s and 1930s.
Paul Hey, illustration for the Princess on the Pea
Austrian illustrator Felicitas Kuhn was everywhere in my childhood, and many of her picture books are stereotypically cute - like this one.
Felicitas Kuhn, illustration for Litte Brother, Little Sister
It's too tight, too linear, the picture too full for my adult taste.
But in the early 1960s, she illustrated a collection of fairy tales (Grimm, Bechstein, Andersen and lesser known authors) that was much better, in a more open, sketchy style. And that's the book I read hundreds of times, and was in love with the illustrations.
- felicitas kuhn rumpelstilzchen.jpg (16.69 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
Felicitas Kuhn, illustration for Rumpelstiltskin
- felicitas kuhn koenigin.jpg (12.71 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
Felicitas Kuhn, illustration for Snow White
Beautiful, airy, expressive water colour work. Just look at that queen's dress. It rustles with pride and vanity.
When my children were young, I decorated their rooms with posters by Marlene Reidel - what a pity they're no longer available.
- marlene reidel.jpg (20.77 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
Marlene Reidel
Totally different from Reidel's clear, didactic, static compositions is the art of Lisbeth Zwerger - I probably fell in love with the Dreaming Way Tarot because I love Zwerger so much, and I see a resemblance.
Okay, so I love good fairy tale illustrations, and there are many, many more! I love fairy tales and have a book shelf full of of fairy tales from all over the world. And I can't resist a tarot deck with a fairy tale topic.
I'm still waiting for Arun publications for a new edition of Lisa Hunt's Fairy Tale Tarot - they even answered me when I asked them when it would be available, and they said 2018, well, that's over soon, but now the [ur=http://www.arun-verlag.de/index.php/art ... hunt.htmll]website [/url]says, winter 2018! Let's hope it's true!
I have the Inner Child Cards - an interesting deck that my daughter used to LOVE when she was a child.
- inner child cards xviii cinderella the moon.jpg (43.04 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
The deck creators found good solutions for "difficult cards" that make it possible to use the deck with children without frightening or confusing them.
- inner child cards xx three little pigs judgement.jpg (26.44 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
And my daughter absolutely loved especially this card:
- inner child cards xxi the world.jpg (77.08 KiB) Viewed 3604 times
The book is a bit of a disappointment - everything is cushioned in so much positive thinking that the very interesting decisions behind the deck get lost a bit. I'm not a fan of the overly busy and colourful illustrations - they're okay but I would have liked them to leave some air to breathe.
Sulamith Wülfing is another illustraotr from my youth, and I'm glad I have her little oracle although I never use it - the texts are too cheesy and trite... but the pictures are still lovely and dreamy.
I just ordered John Bauer's deck - so I can't say anything about it yet - and I have always been sorry that there is no Carl Larsson deck, so maybe John Bauer compensates for that loss? And also that there is no Alan Lee Tarot... although I have his daughter's Lenormand which is quite dreamy... Oh, and I have the Fairytale Lenormand but never read with it either. The cards are very pretty but as reading deck, for a Lenormand, they're over-determined, they're over-significant... I think about the fairy tales, not my life, when I see the images. Still, I'm glad I have it, and if I was a better Lenormand reader, I could read with them, too.
I'm fascinated by Duck Soup's Rackham deck and the 1001 Nights is high on my list. What a pity that so much space was wasted on borders and frames... but still, it's a wish deck.
What other fairy tale inspired or -influenced decks are there? There's a list on AT but it seems incomplete to me - there must be more
Probably it comes in a parcel with a time travel button! 
I swear I miss out on so much because I can't read French.
, but of course there’s nothing quite like a book, especially for bedtime fairytales. (Also cripes, the light!)