Skyline set

Skyline chess is a luxury chess set, with the pieces taking the form of iconic buildings in either London, Paris, Dubai, New York or San Francisco (and more cities in the pipeline). The set comes in several editions; the cheapest costs £95, while the 'luxury bronze' edition will set you back just shy of £3000 ...

I did manage to get my hands on a basic London edition, and I can assure you I paid a lot less for it than £95!

The board it comes with is a simple cardboard fold-up board, but I wanted to create a bit more of a classy board for it, without it costing me the £140 price tag of the official Skyline marble board.

So I first got myself a marble-effect ceramic tile, as a sample from a tile company.

Secondly, I ordered two sets of small ceramic tiles, in two colours, 'victorian white' and 'victorian red'.

The small tiles were glued to the large marble tile, such that the playing area is 45 degrees rotated relative to the 'mother board'.

To finish off the board, I wanted to do something with London's coat of arms, given that the set shows the London skyline.

And I found large stickers sporting it on eBay!

So, with the board completed, time to add the pieces.

The pieces are made from plastic, but they are high quality, and weighted as well, which is something you don't see in cheap plastic pieces. That does show the designers of Skyline chess really aim for the higher end of the market.

The pieces include Big Ben, the London Eye, the Gherkin, the Shard and One Canada Square, Canary Wharf. Terraced houses function as pawns. And if you wonder why the Big Ben rooks look so puny, the pieces are done more or less to scale (actually, if they had really been done to scale, Big Ben would be even smaller than it is now).

I feel I've got myself a fitting and unique board for my Skyline set, and at a fraction of the price of the official luxury boards!