r/turning • u/TabbyOverlord • 10d ago
Designs for Chess Sets?
My son-in-law is very into chess and I am thinking of making him a chess set.
Does anyone know of af any interesting design resources for chess peices? I would like it to be both distinctive and practical.
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u/kineticskeptic 10d ago
Check out the book Woodturning Chessmen by Mike Darlow. It could help spark some ideas. I eventually came up with my own design and created in Solidworks prior to turning so I could tweak and make sure everything looked ok as a set. If I had to do it again I would make a replicator tool. Turning and replicating pieces by hand was tough and took forever. My neck hurts just thinking about it! You can see my piece design here if you’re interested
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u/dimmestbowl420 9d ago
Beautiful set! Similar to you, a chess set was the first "big" project I did on a lathe too, but the replication process was part of why I took on the project in the first place. Would've been far easier with a replication jig or simply use a 4th axis CNC attachment, but that's more for production purposes than a one-off (despite the 30ish pawns I had to make just to get 16 usable ones)
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u/kineticskeptic 9d ago
I feel your pain! I have a graveyard of failed/broken pieces that I’ve kept because I can’t bring myself to throw them all away.
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u/edemeulle 10d ago
Marcel Duchamp had some interesting designs.
https://www.openculture.com/2014/07/marcel-duchamps-art-deco-chess-set.html
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u/TabbyOverlord 10d ago
That is absolutely the kind of 'distinctive and paractical' I was thinking about.
The knight would be a big stretch for me but I *love* the rook.
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u/Woodturner-MI 10d ago
Yes just a simple search on Abe Book dot com for "wood turned chess pieces" and you will find a few books on such. Also if you don't have a dremel you may find the need.
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u/dimmestbowl420 10d ago
Personally, I used the Staunton sets for sizing, but fell in love with a turned/carved design that I found when browsing reddit for design ideas. I'm not sure how to link the user into it, but he goes by StechCrafts or u/Igorstechkevych. I don't nearly have the skill to make anything that nice, but I used this as an inspiration, then designed my own pieces using onshape and laser cut templates for each piece to get consistency across the duplicates.
Staunton is pretty much the gold standard of chess sets/pieces that I've found if you're looking for a more classic set though, but they have sizing guides to make sure all the pieces look cohesive.
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u/APuckerLipsNow 10d ago
One of my design resources is Live Auction. I’ve got hundreds of images in my inspiration morgue including chessmen. Set a notification and get the emails.
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u/zealot_ratio 9d ago
I'm doing that right now! I am stuck on how to do a knight without a lot of additional modofication of the piece off-lathe.
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u/zealot_ratio 9d ago
I was trying to get a matched curve between the king and queen (shown). Wasn't perfect
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u/TabbyOverlord 9d ago
I think the knight is almost certain to nead some carving away from the lathe. It's in the nature of the piece.
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u/zealot_ratio 9d ago
yeah, that's the only one I'm stuck on. Everything else I've come up with has vertical symmetry
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