Hi
I live in Dublin and along with my son Ciaran, we have been collecting chess sets for about 20 years. Ever since our first purchase of a weighted Jaques wood set for €30 in the mid 80s we have been ‘hooked’.
When we started collecting there was a reasonable supply of good antique sets available particularly if, when on holidays, you tramped the highways and byways of Britain searching for them in every small antique shop or car boot sale. But even then when we found good sets, because of our budget, they often had to be left behind. Now with with the family grown there is a little more disposable income but of course any quality sets now command a high price and getting a ‘bargain’ is almost impossible with the advent of the internet.
Our approach is always to try to upgrade our collection and if that means having to sell a good quality item to raise the funds to get something that is of special interest to us, then we are prepared to do so. To facilitate our approach we developed our web site -
ChessAntiquesOnline
which not only offers items for sale but also has sections which help spread the word about chess collecting and provide opportunities for others to source information which can help in the building their collections.
Robert's new initiative, in developing a top quality interactive web site for collectors, is badly needed and hopefully all members will be proactive in making contributions to it – as that is the only way it will remain vibrant into the future.
Regards,
Dermot
