Chess Pieces

Wholesale Chess has a sale on chess sets and this one's just lovely:

This is the Hackamore Series made of Rosewood and Boxwood and it's a bargain at $129.99! Few things please me more in life as a well-crafted chess set and this is one of them. The detail on the knight is breathtaking and the queen's crown is precise and glorious. Those are usually the two pieces I always look at when determining whether I like a particular set.

The next is the cut in the bishop's mitre. In low-quality sets, this feature is usually just a crude slit, not fashioned the way it is in the set above. The weight of the pieces is a marker of quality as well—the heavier, the better.

A closer look:

While that's a really good set, this next one is an astoundingly good set:

Oh mama!

This is the Hastings Series from the world famous (if you're a chess player anyway) House of Staunton by Jacques of London. The king is four inches high and weighs 66 ounces. The set costs $800—$713.99 at Wholesale. Why? Well, for starters, the black pieces are ebony (the white's boxwood).

For the record, I'm not affiliated with Wholesale Chess and will not get a single penny if you buy these, so enjoy!.