Collecting Chess Sets Archives

Chess Blogs October 25, 2019

Why I collect chess sets, by John Lawson

People typically collect chess sets for many reasons. Wooden chess sets are beautiful. They can be collected economically. There are many, many styles for every taste and décor, and they can be displayed attractively in one’s home or office. Best of all, you can play chess with them! These are all good reasons, but I started collecting chess sets for a different reason: I play chess variants.

Chess can be played by other rules than the FIDE rules we are familiar with. In fact, FIDE chess is actually a variant of the form of chess played in Europe in Medieval times. The moves of the Bishop and Queen were once much more limited. Thousands of chess variants have been invented by enthusiasts, many with pieces with novel moves on larger boards, and in order to play them, you have to assemble a larger and more varied set of pieces than normal chess set.

I have seven Chessbazaar sets I can use as a source of pieces to assemble sets for playing variants. They are all boxwood and ebonized boxwood so that all the colors match. The sets are:

M0040 The Classic Series Cone Shaped Chess Pieces

M0051 The Wooden Hour Glass Series Chess Pieces

R0340 The Championship Series Staunton Chess Set

R0342 The Australian War Memorial Reproduced Chess Set by ACF

S1273 Minimalist Hermann Ohme Chess Set

VJ082 Geometric Minimalist Pattern Seamless Design Chess Pieces

R0397B 1940s Art Deco Series Weighted Chess Pieces

To demonstrate how I would select the pieces to create a variant set, I’ll set up an array to play “Tamerlane Chess” as an example. Tamerlane Chess was played in the area that is now Iran and Central Asia and is called that because, according to legend, it was a favorite of Tamerlane (Timur), who carved out an empire in that area in the 14th Century. Tamerlane is played on a 10×11 square board. (An Internet search will easily find the complete rules if you interested.) Sadly, the paper-and-cardboard Tamerlane Chessboard I made for myself is not available, so I will lay out the pieces on my chess table with the same spacing and orientation as if they were on the 10×11 Tamerlane board.

Also Read: Why Handmade Wooden Chess Sets are expensive?

My typical process is to start with a Staunton set to represent the pieces in whatever variant I’m playing whose moves are identical to modern FIDE pieces. For this example, I am using R0340, The Championship Series Staunton Chess Set.

Tamerlane Chess – Step 1

In the Tamerlane variant: there are three different pieces with diagonal moves reminiscent of the Bishop; Rooks and two pieces whose orthogonal moves resemble the Rook; Knights and two pieces whose moves resemble Knights. There are no Queens, and eleven Pawns are needed.

The diagonal-moving pieces have moved of three different ranges, but none move exactly like a Bishop. I will select Bishops of three different designs that suggest, to me, their different ranges.

Available Bishops

I am choosing the R0342 (Australian War Memorial Reproduced Chess Set), S1273 (Minimalist Hermann Ohme Chess Set), and R0397B (1940s Art Deco Series) Bishops.

Tamerlane Chess – Step 2

The orthogonal-moving pieces include a Rook and two pieces of shorter range.

Available Rooks

I have selected the R0340 (The Championship Series Staunton Chess Set) Rook, and the M0051(Wooden Hour Glass Series) and R0342 (Australian War Memorial Reproduced Chess Set) Rooks.

Tamerlane Chess – Step 3

The leaping pieces include a Knight and two leaping pieces of longer range.

Available Knights

I have selected the R0340 (The Championship Series Staunton Chess Set) Knight and the R0342 ( The Australian War Memorial Reproduced Chess Set ) and S1273 ( Hermann Ohme Chess ) Knights.

Tamerlane Chess – Step 4

I need eleven Pawns, so I will have to use Pawns from two different sets. The Pawns need to be visually similar, since having two very different designs would be confusing.

Available Pawns

I will use the R0340 pawns (The Championship Series ), plus three similar pawns from the S1273 (Hermann Ohme Chess Set) set. As R0340 pawns are captured, I will use them to replace the S1273 Pawns on the board.

Tamerlane Chess – Step 5

And now we have the Tamerlane Chess game set up and ready to play, and because we used sets with similar finishes, and gave some thought to how we selected the other pieces, we should be able to play with little risk of spoiling the game by misidentifying a piece.

Tamerlane Chess – Ready to play!

More to Read: Chess Board and Pieces Dimensions

Also Read: 6 Tips to Choose the Best Chess Board for Your Need

Chess Blogs April 29, 2019

My Journey as a Chess Collector by Stephen Kong (Chess Praxis)

My interest in chessmen collecting started way back in 1995 on a small scale basis. Not until till June 2017 when Mike John Ladzinski included me into his FB group page “Staunton Chess Set vintage and new post your set” suddenly my interest grows and the collection increased exponentially.

Collecting for me is quite different from hoarding. Collecting means appreciating artifacts as symbols of human activity, as milestones, or mementos of certain cultural trends. It means cataloging, delving into the origins, documenting if possible provenance and former owners, the uses, etc. It also means preserving old things, as we are only temporary holders of them, and somebody will come after us to observe, preserve, use and question our collector’s items. The more time one can devote to the collection the more one learns — about the things themselves, their background — and ultimately about ourselves as well!

It is a good idea to limit one’s scope — for the simplest of reasons like space, time and money. But also because nobody can collect everything, even in a small field. A collection can be nicely rounded without being encompassing or enormous.

As a collector and lifelong chess player with some ambitions I have concentrated on the tools of the game — pieces mainly, with some boards and clocks along. That would be the mainstream in chess collecting. Other collectors might be more interested in chess variants (like Shogi, Turkish chess, Thai or Burmese chess, Mongolian chess, etc.), in chess stamps, in fine literature on chess, in chess books, chess mementos, and so on.

Over the years I have collected numerous chess books and playing in the overseas tournament as well, meeting new friends and visiting new places. I have tried to capture as many as possible of my collection strains on the web, which has become a useful tool for comparing, buying and selling, and congregating collectors on an international scale. My aim as a collector is to understand and learn — and to provide a bit of support for others who are tramping along the same trail.

There are many parts of the above lines, which resonate deeply with me. Just to give one example, when I began collecting chess sets, I liked the Lardy, it was amazing. Then my collection starts to increase exponentially. Thanks to chessbazaar for the fine reproductions, I ended by buying their many sets but here are some of the favorites. The Hungarian set, Romanian set, Blackburne set, 1849 ver 1, Dubrovnik, Austrian, Richard Whitty, Lasker(chess praxis version) Duchamp and many. Recently, I have collaborated with CB to reproduced the antique B&Co set and the Knubbel set which has been applauded by the collector’s community.

To sum up my experiences, as a collector we must begin with an end in mind. What exactly we are collecting. I focus mainly on the FIDE tournament set.

Chess Blogs May 9, 2017

5 Reasons Why Collecting Chess Sets is a Good Idea?

Chess is a wonderful game of intelligence and strategy. The beauty of this game is that any person, who has the understanding of this game and its moves, can play with any other person irrespective of his/her age. Though, chess comes in different qualities and material like plastic chess sets, bronze chess sets, metallic chess sets, wooden chess sets and so on, however, collecting wooden chess set has a trend which started in the 19^th century.

In fact, there are different people all around the world who likes to collect different chess sets as most of them differentiate from their designs, height, and color. Most of the people from clubs or serious collectors invest in most modest wooden chess sets, which is a prestige to collect for the collectors.

Now, let us put down some of the main and top 5 reasons as to why collecting chess sets is a good idea:

Chess sets never come with an expiry date. The chess you bought today can be preserved by your great grand children in years to come making your collection an antique one. Wood chess was introduced to this world in the 18^th century and still, we can find those antique and vintage chess collections in some museums or collectors. Some of the best-preserved chess set goes for thousands of dollars in auctions. For example, famous J. Jaques of London produced the first Staunton chess set in 1849. Hundred of chess sets were manufactured, however, only a few of them are left in good condition. On popular demand from our chess collector community, we bought the reproduction of 1849 to this world and have already sold over 100 chess sets.

2. The wood chess industry is based in India and is a cottage industry. Only a few chess tuners and artisans are left making the wood chess sets a rare and Chessbazaar Chess Set Reviews collectible item for future. Having said this, many other collectible chess comes in different types like a bone set, metal chess set, marble chess set which are not as collectible as the wooden chess set. If you get bored with your chess collection, you can easily sell them online or can donate to any school or club or charity.

3. Chess set placed in a house can be a beautiful décor. Chess comes in different sizes, designs and wood types. Depending upon your décor arrangement and your wall color, you can choose between the size and wood type. According to our internal survey, held in 2016, around 35% of our customers bought the chess set for their décor purpose. Our best seller for décor is the Dragon chess set in bud rosewood. The size of this chess set is 4.6” King and the impressive dragon styled knight is the main point of attraction of this design, making it the best design for the décor purpose.

Collecting Chess Sets

4. Chess is the best companion and now it’s easy to take it along with you wherever you travel. Traveling some time can be a boring due to flight delays or long distance traveling. The travel chess set comes handy here. They come in different sizes and can be easily fit in our pockets. Starting from 5” size chess box, it goes all the way up to 16” chess set. Playing chess during travel will not only help you fight the boredom, but you will arrive much fresh and will also help you fight jet lag, though it is not medical proven yet.

5. When we retire, we look for some form of work that makes us busy and must be relaxing. Chess has some unbelievable advantages if you’re above 60 years of age. It will not only keep you engaged, but it also help fight some very dangerous brain diseases like brain fog, stress, anxiety and prevents Alzheimer.

Though, there are many other benefits of playing chess like increasing your IQ levels etc. however, collecting these magnificent pieces of history will give you much satisfaction. Still not convinced, no problem, buy yourself an chess set under US $100 today and feel the difference.