AURex 2,029 Posted December 25, 2020 Share Posted December 25, 2020 A really interesting article in the NY Times about chess sets. And this note has a reason. The type of chess sets used in tournament play are not your dime store molded plastic. The pieces are made of wood. They are weighted and balanced and sized for ease of handling, especially in tournament fast and blitz play situations to break ties. Most pieces can be machine carved, but knights cannot. Knights must be hand carved, and of course, for a set, the four knights must match. The more expensive sets have a lot of detail -- you can see the teeth, the fine wave of mane, etc. The cost of hand carving the knights is usually half the cost of the set. Now to the reason for this note. The top producer of tournament and quality chess sets is a company called House of Staunton. They do sell cheaper sets, but for fine sets and tournament play, the sets typically start at $300. House of Staunton is one of the top chess companies in the world. Here's the address of their store. The House of Staunton 288 Dunlop Boulevard, Building 400 Huntsville, AL 35824 Their website is here -- https://www.houseofstaunton.com/ The very interesting NYTimes article is here -- https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/24/business/chess-sets-cost-queens-gambit.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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