Chess piece given time. Except for castling and the knight's move, no piece may jump over another piece . The variety of designs available is broad, from small cosmetic changes to highly abstract representations, to themed designs such as those that emulate the drawings from the works of Lewis Carroll, or modern treatments such as "Star Trek" or "The Simpsons". Themed designs are generally intended for display purposes rather than actual play . Some works of art are designs of chess sets, such as the modernist chess set by chess enthusiast and dadaist Man Ray, that is on display in the Museum
Chess piece makes the pieces bottom heavy and do not topple easily (a well-weighted piece should come upright even if bent to 60 degrees off vertical axis). This helps in blitz games as the speed of movement doesn't offer enough time or precision in dropping the pieces onto the intended squares. The length of each side of the squares on the chessboard should be about 1.25–1.3 times the diameter of the base of the king, or . Squares of about are normally well suited for pieces with the kings in the preferred size range. These criteria are from the United States Chess