Library or Tournament Size Jaques Set?

Feel free to ignore the posts that you don't like.  I will feel free to exercise my freedom of expression.

Indeed, but all the OP has done is refinish the surface on a chessboard - it's not like he's taken his belt-sander to the Arc of the Covenant

I understand that he's not whitewashing the Mona Lisa.  But based on the OP's description of the board in his posts #12-13, he indicated that this was not just another chessboard, but rather a 19th century antique that he was purchasing from an antiques dealer in Hong Kong and having shipped to London, and which he would be paying a commensurate price for.  If instead we were talking about a relatively inexpensive contemporary chessboard, I would not have bothered to comment on the issue. 

A final comment - from the photos of the board in post #13, I'm not positive, but it appears to me that the wood of the dark squares might be walnut.

At this point there is nothing more I feel the need to say on the the issue of refinishing, other than to wish the OP much pleasure and enjoyment playing with his nice set.

Dredging up this thread. 

 I found it whilst trying to decide on a board/square size for my Jaques pieces as I’ve decided to remake a board I made some years ago which has squares far too big. Turns out my pieces are very similar if not identical to these. The same 42 mm bases for 87 mm tall kings (inches are bad enough but decimal inches‽ 😬😫), same drop-jaw knights etc  

Was the consensus of opinion that this is a library set or tournament? Is it a very unusual size?

I see Minarima hasn’t been on here since last year but I must say I’m very intrigued to know what he paid for the set (I won’t brag again about how mine came to me).

Also re. refinishing, as I read through this thread I let out a howl of disbelief when I saw the refinished board, stripping off those years of built up French polish, the depth of colour and history seems sacrilegious to me. It’s hard to tell from a photo but it now looks like a modern board with an antique frame. 

Each to their own though. 

87mm= 3.43 inches.  Library size (which I thought was 3.5" but that's about 1/16" short of 3.5")

 3.425 actually. 

😝

Although as I've found through reading the inimitable Alan Dewey, Jaques sets were categorised by base size. 

I’ve decided on 50.8mm squares for my board. 

😊

I was amazed to see Minarima’s set, it’s so alike to mine I had to go and check...

From the original photo of the board, it was drop dead gorgeous "as is."  At the very least, he should have waited a year before doing anything.

He removed its patina, the crudeness of its originality, its scars of life, its unadulterated mystique of Hong Kong, questions of who might have played on it, what intrigue its games may have contained.

Sure, it is refinished, and he can tell himself that the refinish is of higher quality than the original, but…

Had he left it alone, gotten used to playing chess on its original surface, heard the comments of those who played against him, about how lucky he was to own such a great combination of board and pieces — now relegated to qualifier-explanation of what he had had done to it —  now it is... oh, well… live and learn.

Minarima hasn't posted on this thread in over two years… that's what happens when "oof!" comes in… to… "play."

A very beautiful set of chessmen!

Old thread, but have to say, I really like the proportion of the rooks to the knights. In almost every reproduction set I see, the knights stand slighly taller and are "beefier" than the rooks, which looks odd to my eye. These proportions are perfect. 

Years later, but I have to say I'm with Russbell on this one. Every owner is free to do whatever they feel is right, and I'm sure the owner had the very best of intentions. But patina is history in my view. When you refinish, you remove an important part of that history. Just an opinion, of course. 

On the size, which I'm not sure if you ever resolved, it's a tournament-size set. Lovely pieces - and now seven years older than when you first posted! Hope you still have them and are enjoying them more than ever!

Countertheory, old chap, there may be two competing theories on knight/rook height ratio. Looking at Fersht's brochure, it seems the 1849 knights were a touch taller than the rooks, while in your next decade set they are clearly shorter. I rather like both (different ratios for different days). Cheers.

Hi! Sorry, I feel out of the loop. Which next-decade set of mine? I don't recall posting anything about this. Apologies.

I have a few Jaques sets but I don't have any in which the knight is shorter than the rook.

Apologies, countertheory! I confused Minimara's pictured set as being yours, and CoatueDefense's comment about the proportion of rooks to knights as being yours

Lately we've been having server interruption problems, making it difficult to flit from post to post.

Ah, I thought it must have been for someone else! No worries.