Fancy Checkers

Sometimes and reluctantly, I make useful things (not to be confused with utilitarian!).

For this checkers set I tried to achieve the look and feel that showcases ceramics as it is - intrinsically beautiful and tactile material.

Thus I choose black stoneware with big chunks of light grog to make the board. I scraped each of 32 light squares once the clay was almost dry, which made them contrast beautifully to the untouched dark ones. For pieces I picked two different porcelains: ultra-white one from Jingdezhen, world capital of porcelain and black one with a fancy name, Black Ice.

To let materials speak for themselves I tried to achieve the look which could be dated both 1000 BCE as well as 2500 CE: the simplest organic design, putting superfluous limitations away: why should all figures be strictly the same, or take strict geometrical shapes?

Aren't all the people, leaves on the same tree, pebbles on the beach similar yet different? At the same time having every piece different gives so much more tactile pleasure while actually playing and fidgeting with captured pieces.

Happy offline games!

Black stoneware, white porcelain, black porcelain, 22x22 cm