You will need: one pack of cards. Fred Dinenage optional.

Here’s the set-up. Fred will ask Gareth to pick a card, and he’ll turn it upside-down before his very eyes. Let’s see if he can do it…

Good start. Gareth has picked a card. It’s…

The Jack of spades. Fred, of course, is looking the other way.

Back into the pack it goes, wherever Gareth wants.

There it goes.

But as Fred fans the cards out…

There it is! Gareth’s card, the other way up to all the others in the pack. Astounding!

Gareth isn’t sure which is more surprising – the trick, or that it was Fred who managed to pull it off. However, the rest of us just want to know how it’s done, and Fred will explain.

Gareth picks a new card. While he’s looking at it and showing it to us…

…Fred craftily flips the bottom card over, so the pack looks the same either way up.

Then he can deftly turn the whole pack over, and nobody can tell the difference.

Gareth puts his card back into the pack, but of course, only the top card is face-down – all the rest are face-up. One tip: it helps if your pack of cards has a white border on both sides. Then it’s harder to spot the trick if the cards get fanned out a little at this point.

While distracting everyone with a bit of patter, Fred flips the pack over again, so now…

…Gareth’s card (and the one on the bottom) are the only ones which are face-up. Ta-daa!

Practice, practice, practice, and work out what you’re going to say while you’re casually flipping the pack of cards over. Then try it on your mates, and let us know how you got on in the comments.