Quarto - Woodworking for Mere Mortal

  Often I am inspired by something that I've seen on the net.  I have a number of woodworking sites that I regularly visit and recently I went to woodworkingformeremortals.com and watched Steve's video on Making a Quarto Board Game. 

  Quarto has a couple of positive traits that are not obvious until you play the game.  It is fun, easy to learn and a game is over is just a few minutes. I find it is easier when I can  give a game serious attention for a few minutes rather then for longer periods.  A series of short games seems more social to me.  There is more time for relaxing, drinking coffee and chatting without reducing the quality of game play.

  This is the first set of game pieces I made. The tall pieces are four inches tall and the pieces are over one inch in diameter. As you can see I haven't made a board yet.

  I used spruce for the game pieces, because I had some laying about and I thought the grain pattern would show well when stained.  The cylinders were turned on my lathe using my Easy Wood Tools.  I then stained the dark pieces using Minwax  stain.

  After I made this large set of game pieces I began to wonder about something more portable.

  This set is made from 3/4 inch wood blocks and dowels.  The game board is 5 3/8 inches square and is going to be a great set of travelling game pieces. I decided that I would drill the holes in both ends of the pieces so that none of the game pieces has a top or bottom. It makes setting up the pieces slightly quicker by eliminating errors during set up.

  For both of the set of game pieces a drill press is almost compulsory.  Everything else can be made with the most basic of tools but since the hole in the top is the only feature on the pieces it is best to get it centred, straight and the same depth.

  I am thinking that a small box that had the game board as one side will the next part of this project. I'll keep you posted.

cheers, ianw