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i made all my pieces out of paper and matboard, and they are functional and somewhat durable, but they're all flat and not particularly attractive. i think in the past prizes have mostly been whatever people have been willing to donate, i don't think the editors go out and buy stuff, altho i did get a chess variants t-shirt when i was the winner of the 38square contest. i also received the book meta-chess, which was donated by the author. i believe most of the commercial games given as prizes were donated by the inventors. <P> once you start talking about unusual chess pieces that match standard sets, the options are extremely limited. the omegachess set is a good place to start, but only provides 2 new pieces styles. gothicchess adds 2 more, and they are sharp-looking, but they're also in a different style from the standard staunton pieces. if you're talking about wood instead of plastic, the chavet pieces look good (i've ordered some but haven't received them), there's 6 different pieces, you can get more info if you link from the editors page to the homepage of editor jean-louis cazaux. the best option is the superchess pieces (www.superchess.nl). there's 16 different models available (besides the standard 6 chess pieces) and they all look great. but since they are handmade from wood (and if you live in america they must be shipped from the europe), they are not inexpensive. since haerington seems to be doing superchess more as a hobby than a business, i would expect that donating pieces to the contest would not be practical for him.