To be honest, I got this vintage xiangqi set off eBay for two reasons: I really liked the box it came in. And it was cheap. The listing didn't show much else, so it was a bit of a gamble, but you have to admit, it's a nice box, right?
Chess Creations & Collection
Sunday, July 20, 2025
Large vintage wooden set
Friday, July 11, 2025
Eurasian chess set
Eurasian chess is a hybrid between Xiangqi (Chinese chess) and Western (FIDE) chess. The pieces, their movement, movement restrictions, and the layout of the board are really sort of halfway between its two 'parents', and it also has a piece (the vao) which isn't part of either, but is inspired by both.
Monday, February 17, 2025
'Cheeky Dragons' set
Over the years, I've bought several chess sets from a guy calling himself 'Ogg the Clever' (see here, here, here and also here for a non-chess set). When he added a 'cheeky dragons' set to his line-up, I really wanted them!
And not just 'wanting' ..... I thought those would be perfect for a xiangqi set, and 'Ogg' was very willing to amend the numbers of the various pieces so they would make a full xiangqi set.
The set didn't come with a board, and I felt the black wooden board I've used before would be the perfect match.
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Modern wooden set
Saw this modern wooden xiangqi set, for not very much, and I really liked it, so ...
Friday, January 24, 2025
Dragon cloth set
I've got a few Janggi (Korean chess) sets in the collection: one commercial set for which I made a perspex board, one travel set, and a self-made set for a large Janggi variant: Gwangsanghui. Janggi sets available commercially are few and far between, so when I saw a plastic red and blue set for very little, I got it.
The set didn't come with any board, so I had to make that myself, obviously. After rejecting several ideas, I decided on creating a board from cloth, and adding the 'points' on which the game is played by using plastic gaming chips. Found a nice piece of cloth, with dragons, on the internet.
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
Aviation chess
Aviation chess was invented in 1913, and played during WW I. In most aspects, this chess variant is identical FIDE chess, but there is one difference: the pawns on the b-file and g-file are replaced by 'aviators'. These 'aviators' fly diagonally, over any number of pieces, to either an empty square, or a square occupied by an enemy piece (which is then captured and replaced).
As one of my other interests is Spitfires and their history, I decided to adapt Aviation chess slightly by having Spitfires as 'aviators'!
Off eBay, I got a full set of 32 laser cut chess pieces (of course, I don't need four of the pawns) as well as four laser cut Spitfire shapes. They smell really nice as a result of the laser-cutting process!
Then I used two colours of wood stain ('pine' and 'mahogany', respectively) to create the 'white' and 'black' pieces.
I decided to use the board of my Kyrgyz set, as it had the right size squares and also looks relatively old.
So there we go: a Spitfire-inspired set for Aviation chess!