Chess board

I built these from some plans in a magazine several years ago. I’ve still got the plans but can’t remember what magazine they came from. A friend found them and wanted me to help him build them. He had some good ideas but had trouble following through on them so I ended up buying the wood and never seeing him in the shop again. I like chess and loved the looks of the board so I ended up having enough wood for two complete boards with drawers and one board top that stood on the corners as legs, no drawers.

The wood is wenge and curly maple on the top and the body and drawers is mahogany. There are drawers on both sides held by spring clips to keep them shut.

I altered the plans which called for a nearly impossible doweling of the squares to each other. After finding the bits wandered in the hard woods I altered the plans to glue the squares to a plywood substrate for stability. I used old business cards in between each square to give them just a little space to grow and shrink and it has held together for a good 10 years.

Each square has a chamfer on each side that sets them apart and looks nice, imho. The finish is hand rubbed tung oil and it still looks great. I wish I had some real nice chess men to complete the set. Mine are just some old cheap ones but they still work!

I don’t get to play on it much but I’m glad when I can pull it out and play someone a game. Thanks for looking.