Harry Potter Wizard's Chess Chessboard

spoudastis

Sr Member
RPF PREMIUM MEMBER
To start, i dont like Harry Potter but i do love chess so when i learned that there was a chess set featured in the movie i wanted to try and replicate it for my collection. In searching for reference i found that a fellow RPF member Pete SSS built a fantastic board which i found a wonderful source of inspiration, his thread is located here:

http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=147539

So here are a couple of screen shots from the movie that i went from.

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First off the pieces. They are Isle of Lewis chessmen, there are a number of places that you can get a good replica set, etsy from user "oggtheclever", or from ebay like i did from "winkingblindbats" which is of great quality. After i received the pieces i had to decide how big to make the squares and in turn how big the full board should be. These are large pieces and at first i used 2" squares but i felt like the pieces were too cramped so i went up to 2.25". I drew it out on paper in a few different sizes first before i started drawing in the computer. mock up below at 2.125" which i thought was still too small.

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i have to thank @PeteSSS for his build and i have to admit that i redrew a pattern that he made for the boarder as i could not find any reference myself and i though his looked great. below are my drawings done in rhino3D ( a CAD program i use a lot at work for 3d modeling but is killer at 2d as well). boarder close up and final board with pieces separated so as to be printed on an 11x17 laser printer.

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I wanted to find paper that would simulate leather so i picked up some "silktouch nuba" by skivertex at FLAX art supply. this stuff is awesome, its kind of soft and has a nice tight grain print. its not too expensive, about $5 for a 17x36 sheet, i got black and cream color. I cut the paper down to 11x17 so i could run it through the laser printer at work. It needs to be printed with toner so that the gold foil will react and stick. I used "minc" heat reactive foil and the cheapest laminator i could find on amazon, i think it was $15.

you take a sheet of the foil and tape it to the leather paper then i ran it through the laminator twice. then i peel off the foil sheet and the foil sticks to only the toner that was printed on the paper, its pretty amazing and worked perfectly.

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next i cut out all of the boarders and squares which was extremely tedious trying to cut them perfectly. below is an image of a mock up before anything was glued down, i was starting to get really excited at this point. the only bummer is that the largest i could print was 11x17 so i had to split the boarders into two pieces, definitely not ideal as matching would be difficult later.

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to be continued...
 
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Great work! I've had some Lewis chessmen for a few years but never got around to making a board for them. Subbed :)
 
I bought a piece of MDF to use for the board itself, i had to cut it down to size and got it within 1/16" of square, i knew this might be an issue later as all the paper pieces are hand cut and all the tiny errors tend to add up. the board ended up being 22" square. I wanted to get MDF instead of plywood because i didnt want any grain showing through once the paper was glued down. Because i wanted the board to feel like leather i needed it to be a little softer than just gluing the leather paper onto the MDF so i spray mounted really thick craft paper onto the MDF first, then ill glue the leather paper on top. Next i drew on the square grid and clamped a straight edge to make sure the squares go on in line.

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Gluing down 64 individual squares plus the boarders was a lot of work. I was probably sweating it trying to get everything to align perfectly. I researched different glues for a long time and settled on "UHU stic" glustick. it seems to be the choice for mixed media artists so i gave it a try and it worked perfectly. the glue is not clumpy and goes on smooth unlike your typical school grade gluestick. of course the small cutting errors did result in errors at the corners of the boarder pieces but i covered the small 1/32" gaps with a gold marker. I was very pleased with the look as i was finishing up the gluing.

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After i glued all the paper down and wrapped it under the board it was time to install the feet. I looked for suitable feet for weeks everywhere you could imagine. Finally i cam upon a set of vintage solid brass drawer pulls on ebay that i thought were perfect, they are not screen accurate but they had the character that i though worked perfectly for the board. next i drilled and tapped holes in the MDF to screw in the feet.

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Finally i bought some felt on amazon and covered the bottom of the board, gluing with diluted white glue, which really cleaned up the appearance

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After i installed the felt and the feet i was ready to flip it over and get my isle of lewis pieces on there, and i was very pleased with the results.

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I still had one more piece to add though which i had been agonizing over for a few weeks, the edge trim, i was even considering not adding it because i could not find exactly what i wanted. I searched high and low and finally found miniature wood trim with a bead detail buried in amazon. because i am using 3/4" MDF i needed the trim to be 1/2" in order to have the small step visible in the screen shots and all the trim i was finding with the correct pattern was 3/4". Becaused the trim is so small it is embossed with the detail (pressed) not carved. The trim is wood and in order to get a really smooth finish i had to do many rounds of sanding and filler primer to get rid of the wood grain. Once i did the gold spray paint went on very smooth and had a great finish. I painted all the trim then cut it to size on my chop saw then fixed it to the board using brads from a nailer. I then had to go back and fill the small brad holes and do some touch up paint. Finally i applied a brown oil wash thinned heavily with turpinoid to bring out the detail and give it a bit of a used/worn look.

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GREAT WORK! Thanks for sharing! I got my Isle of Lewis chessmen from Ogg a while back and built a board for them, but not based on a specific design - this is a very classy execution.
 
GREAT WORK! Thanks for sharing! I got my Isle of Lewis chessmen from Ogg a while back and built a board for them, but not based on a specific design - this is a very classy execution.

Fantastic work. Your hours of agonizing definitely paid off.

nice work man...it came out great!

Fantastic!

Glad you all like it. Now the challenge is where do i display it?? i think i may hang it on the wall and maybe make a small shelf for the chessmen.

cheers!
 
I think the next step needs to be adding an electro-magnet on rails and a voice command system to the underside :D

very nice work.
 
Well, this makes me VERY happy! What a blast from the past. I'm so glad someone else has tackled this too, It's a pretty fun build isn't it?

You've totally nailed it mate, great job. Incidentally, my board is hanging on my wall, with a little shelf above it displaying the Lewis Chessmen, just like your planning. It's a nice thing to have up.
 
Yes, Pete I'm happy you saw my build! I had been admiring yours for some time as well as the innovative techniques you used. I definitely would not have done this if not for your build, so thank you. It was fun but way more work than I thought it would be. I would love to see how yours looks hanging up. Cheers.


Well, this makes me VERY happy! What a blast from the past. I'm so glad someone else has tackled this too, It's a pretty fun build isn't it?

You've totally nailed it mate, great job. Incidentally, my board is hanging on my wall, with a little shelf above it displaying the Lewis Chessmen, just like your planning. It's a nice thing to have up.
 
When I read the thread name I was partially expecting the wizarding chess from the end of the movie/book.
But this... this is amazing! The details!

I really love it and would sell out my best friend and their kid for one too!
 

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