Your soldiers never go AWOL
Impeccable quality and timeless enduring beauty
to be cherished throughout the ages.
Bespoke Design
Crafted from billet milled aluminium and beautifully finished in exotic, hard wearing, anodized and ceramic coated custom colour finishes.
​These Staunton Chess Armies are customised in consultation with the client and are colour themed and branded
to reflect the owners personal tastes or corporate identity.
Our chess armies sit comfortably
in the most spectacular of surroundings.
Western and Great chess armies.
'Staunton' soldiers re-imagined
Our passion for detail can be seen in our lavishly designed Staunton soldiers.
Each soldier is based on the 'Classic Staunton' design, with the soldiers having been re-imagined
to enhance their character while retaining their heritage.
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Our armies come with a second Queen.
A design revolution:
Seize the past and invade the future.
A little bit of history.
Staunton Chessmen
In 2015 Jon Crooke designed a new take on the
Staunton Chess pieces.
Featuring sturdy bodies with new body detailing,
a taller Tower to reflect its power and
it's size 'relative' to a real life siege tower it represents,
and a Knight with a synergised body.
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Footnote: Recently the designer became aware of a
1891 Staunton design variation
by William Moffatt. See picture below.
A taller Tower and a synergised Knights body.
History is full of surprises.
Royal Chessmen Imperial Mark 2
Designer - William Moffatt
In 1900, the British Chess Company (BCC 1891-1907) issued the
new Royal Chessmen Imperial Mark 2 set or “Improved Staunton”.
One of the distinguishing features was that the BCC owner and designer, William Moffatt, pursued the approach of aligning the
size of the pieces with their playing value, which led to a clear enlargement of the towers to signal their higher playing value compared to the knights and bishops.
He also gave the Knight a body to match his comrades.
“Original Staunton”
Designers
John Jaques - Nathaniel Cooke
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The Staunton set style and its variations have been
the only chess set design allowed
in major chess tournaments, since the 1920s.
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Prior to 1849, complaints from players about the
unsuitability of many of the contemporary
chess piece designs for practical play,
led noted wood and ivory tuner John Jaques and
journalist - neoclassical architectural enthusiast,
Nathaniel Cooke, to draw up a standard design,
which Jaques could produce at a reasonable cost.
​
The chess design was patented in March 1849
by Nathaniel Cooke and the pieces
were named after the leading English chess master
Howard Staunton, who endorsed it.
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The rest is history. The Staunton pattern chessmen
quickly became the World standard for serious and casual play.
The relatively low production cost brought chess to the masses
and did much to popularize the game.
Its clean, simple design looks as beautiful today as it did upon its introduction almost two century's ago.
Game Design
Great Chess
Game development
In 2010 Jon Crooke developed GREAT CHESS, played on a
8x8, 8x10 or 10x10 plus 4 corner Citadels.
With the re-introduction of two historical 'leapers' and
some move changes, GREAT CHESS is a fast, action packed game,
with a myriad of new tactical possibilities.
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