I'm Abandoning Ebony/Ebonized Chess Setss

After selling and gifting a number of chess sets over the past 6 months, my collection is now down to a single ebony set, two ebonized sets, and two black plastic sets. All of which amount to less than 25% of my collection.

Over time, I've come to prefer rosewoods (including bud and blood rosewoods), padauk, and red sandalwood (where available) to ebony, etc.

WHY?

1) High quality ebony (not stained ebony) is getting harder to find, and more expensive.

2) If the set has intricately carved pieces, ebony masks the details compared to the lighter rosewoods & sheesham.

3) Because of its high density, ebony has a greater risk of cracking and chipping.

4) Ebonized pieces have a tendency of fading and wearing over time, exposing the lighter boxwood underneath.

5) The rosewoods look better on my custom made chess boards and offer a more pleasing (at least to my eye) and complimentary presentation.

If I could trade my HOS ebony BCC repro set for the blood rosewood version, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Would also trade my HOS ebonized Dubrovnik for the sheesham version -- lickity-split! And if the plastic sets were available in a light brown or tan finish, I cash 'em in. That would leave me with one unique 3" ebonized set I got from Alan Dewey, which would be the 'last of the Mohicans.'

I'm amazed at the beauty of sheesham! There are a lot of exotic woods, I wonder why only a few are used in chess making. I also collect knives, and one of the things I value.

I hate to have to break it to you my old chess.com pal, but you have got a SERIOUS case of the chess collector's disease(seems you've entered the phase of not being able to 'be truly happy' no matter what you do).  haha jk

You forgot to add Brown stained boxwood. I have one & its great looking IMO. Sheesham is also great looking with its nice grains showing on the pieces.

I wonder why teak, bocote, ironwood, cocobolo, staghorn, or other materials aren't used. There are a number of cool synthetic materials besides plastic as well.

Also a big fan of sheesham.

BigKing, there's a bench in downtown Cedarburg (WI) with the following inscription on the back rest:

"Enough is just a little bit more."

Kick, I didn't mean to overlook the 'browns.' Would love to have a walnut set, or one of the exotic woods that HOS is currently offering.

Me too. Especially quality sheesham where the vendors take the time to closely match the hues. I think sheesham makes a wonderful combination with boxwood.

I like sheesham too, some people think it is a lower quality wood but I like it's looks.

If you have any craked up set I migh be interested, for some time now I have being loking for craked up set so I can see how to fix it and share this info.

I have one. I bought Jonas's, #1 produced. NOJ has been offering this for some time for about 500 Euros. Do you mean that their chess production has been backed up?

I get it. I hope you do get it soon. Will it be weighted? Mine is not.

It will be waited because its been nearly 4 months now so he's not giving up on it.

Noj is currently backed up.

I have had a GM Pavasovic set on order for 3 or 4 months.  I was told, by Gregor, that they were going to produce this set in the autumn, his word.

Just last week he emailed me saying that their schedule is backed up so much that he hopes he can have it done by Christmas.

Robert, I see on NOJ's website that the set comes weighted, so I guess there's no reason for there to have been any conversation about it. I'm glad they're so busy, but it's frustrating if you're waiting for one of their beautiful sets.

Lou, I have 2 sets with the Walnut pieces, from Noj, and really like them a lot.

The walnut looks great on the green and buff as well as on walnut boards.

I know what you mean. I just got a package from Carl in two days. It left England on Monday and arrived Wednesday morning in New Hampshire. (And in the process I learned that his shop is about 25 miles from where my son lives in the Midlands.) But any one purchase can fill my existential void only so long.

Yup. The ebonized version. Unlike Mike, I haven't forsaken either ebony or ebonized. I haven't had a chance to take more than a couple pieces out of the box yet. I have one of the old HOS Reykjavik II sets, and a Jaques of the era that's a dead ringer for one of the sets they played with, but the knights are incredibly poor carvings. I've posted pictures in another thread. I'm looking forward to it. Happy to do some kind of comparative review. 

Talking about the Fischer/Spassky set.. check this chess set on the House of Staunton Antiques and Collectibles webpage

Never buy ebony.