Four Seasons chess set - winter

At the end of autumn, I had collected the raw material for the pieces in my Four Seasons chess set. So that means that the final phase of creating this chess set would happen over the winter. Here's what I used for the various pieces, and what they look like 'raw'.

Sycamore 'wings' for knights, and chestnuts ('conkers') for elephants:

Pine cones for rooks, and walnuts for kings:

Acorns for pawns, and beech nuts for ferzes:













Couldn't resist putting the unpainted pieces on the board!

At first, my plan was to paint the pieces entirely in the four traditional colours (white, green, red and black, for winter, spring, summer and autumn, respectively). But then, seeing them unpainted on the board, I felt it was better just to paint the bases. That would still allow (more subtle) differentiation of the pieces, but keep the autumnal colours. So this is what the four sets look like, in their corners of the board:

Winter

Spring

Summer

Autumn

And the full board then looks like this:

I'm glad I decided not to paint the pieces completely, but just paint the bases. Really allowed the natural colours to remain. It was fun thinking the whole design through, and completing a Four Seasons chess set over a period of four seasons gave it an extra dimension.

LEGO set

As a kid, I played a lot with LEGO. And that memory made me think about a chess set made from LEGO. Turns out there are several of those! This is the one that is closest to the LEGO I played with as a child, when LEGO consisted mainly of building blocks in different shapes, sizes and colours.

LEGO chess sets are actually no longer on the market, which makes them quite expensive now. However, I did come across one which was already put together, so not in 'mint condition', which makes it less desirable to a LEGO collector, and so a lot cheaper. 

The pieces are quite nicely constructed, although moving them is a bit finicky, so it wouldn't be a set very suitable for actual play (which isn't my intention, so that's not an issue).

The building instructions for this particular set can be downloaded as pdf, so if I really wanted, I could always take it apart completely and build it up again ...

Mystery set

Found this rather small turned wooden set on eBay, without any indication as to its origin.

It didn't come with a board, by the way, so I photographed it on the same board I used for my Staunton set.

So where was it made? When I posted the pictures in a few chess collectors groups on Facebook, the suggestions coming back were Russian, Latvian, Central American, African, and the Philippines ... In other words, it caused a bit of confusion!

Anyone any ideas?

Arthurian set

Saw this heavy resin board, resembling a leather board, on eBay, and got it, thinking I'll find pieces that fit it well one day.

That day indeed came, in the form of an Arthurian set of pieces.

King Arthur as the king (obviously), Guinevere as the queen (equally obviously), Merlin as bishop (who else?), and dragons as knights. I gather the pawns are represented by the Knights of the Round Table.

Reckon the set fits the board quite well, don't you agree?

Soapstone set

African 'tribal' sets made from soapstone are listed on eBay regularly. I really love the feel of soapstone, it's very tactile, so of course I had to get myself a set. Actually, I got a bit more than one set, as shortly after I acquired a full set, an incomplete set in the same style was listed for almost nothing. I did get that one as well, as it would allow me to create set-ups for FIDE chess as well as a few other variants (more on that later).












Pieces acquired, what about a board? I wanted to make a board for this set myself, but really struggled to come up with something. Ideas aplenty, but they all were dismissed again, either because it wasn't doable, or because it just didn't fit with the pieces. So my expanded soapstone set was left on a shelf, board-less, for a long time ...

Until I created a bit of a story for myself. In that story, a very talented sculptress in a small village in, say, Kenya, had been making a good living creating soapstone chess pieces for the tourist market. One day, she was asked if she could also create a board for the pieces, at very short notice. Not having much time, or the necessary material to create a soapstone board, she thought about what she would have to hand that could quickly be made into a chess board. And the answer came to her quite quickly: tin cans from the local rubbish dump! The ends of the cans could very well serve as 'squares' for the board!

So with that idea in mind, I started collecting can ends from whatever we ate over a period of time. Two sizes: larger silvery can ends and small gold-coloured can ends. Piece of plywood and a can of wood stain, plus 66 can ends later, I could put the board together.

I think it works pretty well with the two different can ends!

I'm sure you notice the two extra 'squares'; I'll come to those later. But first let's put the pieces on the board, ready for a game of FIDE chess.

The extra pieces allow me to set up the game for Aviation chess, where two of the pawns are replaced by 'aviators'.

And, finally, making use of the extra 'squares' I can set up the set for Falcon-Hunter chess, where the king starts on a square behind the main row, and a falcon and hunter take the place of the king and queen in that line-up (the variant does not include a queen at all).

It's probably not very obvious from the pictures, but this is a big set. The king measures just over 21cm high and weighs close to half a kilo!

I do feel that the 'tin can end' board adds a rustic feel to the set. Even though pieces and board are completely different in style, for me they sort of complement each other.

Smurfs set

Did you know smurfs play chess? If not, you do now ...

I've always liked smurfs, and they've been around for my entire life, so when I saw a smurfs chess set for a very reasonable price ...

The board is basic cardboard, nothing special. But the pieces, made of plastoy, are very nicely done. Papa Smurf and Smurfette lead the white/red pieces, whereas the black/yellow pieces are led by their black-haired and black-capped counterparts.

I especially like the knights being represented by smurfs riding snails!

I do have a vague idea of creating a large board for them which is basically a smurf village: few smurf houses around the sides, a central fenced-off area featuring 64 squares, and lots of smurfs watching the imminent chess match. Maybe Gargamel lurking behind one of the smurf houses? One day ...

Rebel Fury set

Rebel Fury is one hell of a chess variant. The initial set-up looks like this:

Pieces include Dragons, Capricorns, Gorgons, Harpies, Mimotaurs and Ximaeras. And Furys, which are the 'royal' pieces: they need to be captured to win the game, and each side has two of them ... Most pieces move the same (like the queen in FIDE chess), but have very different powers; full details are here if you're interested

As it's such a crazy chess variant, I was very keen to create a set myself. Surfing around for ideas, I stumbled across a full set of Loka pieces, and these gave me the number and variety I needed for Rebel Fury.

The pieces came in four colours, green, blue, yellow and red, and I decided to use blue and green pieces for one side, yellow and red pieces for the other. Given this amount of colour, I wanted to make a board which was just as colourful, and got myself several sheets of glass mosaic tiles.

A few rainy days were enough to glue the glass mosaic tiles on a piece of plywood, with half the board having red and yellow squares, and the other half green and blue squares. Advancers (pawns) promote once they reach the enemy half of the board, so it makes sense to distinguish between the two halves.

Underside of the board received 'feet' and was painted black.

Those feet raised the board just enough to have mosaic tiles along the edge as well.

So here is the completed board, in all its colourful glory! It's quite heavy as well, by the way; all that glass adds up.

In order to be able to distinguish the pieces more easily, I wrote the first letter of their identity on the underside of their bases.

And all that remains to be done now is to set up the board with all the pieces in their starting position.