Held on 3 July 2025 at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston

During our summer recess, the club is experimenting with various activities. It may seem sacrilege to bring another game into the hallowed playing room of Kingston Chess Club, but bridge and chess have lot in common and many chess players play bridge, or could play bridge with a bit of help and encouragement. We advertised the event to members, to other local chess clubs and even grabbed a couple of people from the bar.

We were delighted to be able to fill four tables for this one-off event. With four people on each table, we had 16 enthusiastic players for the evening. We were privileged to have as our instructor Rosie White from the famous Young Chelsea Bridge Club which is now based at the MindSports Centre in Hammersmith. Rosie has coached a generation of bridge players and was happy to try to convert inveterate chess players to the pleasures of a classic new game.

The evening focused on playing the cards where each pair was given a target number of tricks to win. A trick is won by the player with highest card in each round. We started with no trumps and then moved on to trumps. Each hand was provided from a wallet placed on the table in front of the players. There was no shuffling of cards. Each hand had a specific learning point. Whether the players managed to grasp the point is beside the point – we were having too much fun playing out the cards.

What made the event particularly sociable was the presence of bridge partners: wives, girlfriends and a daughter. The chess community is male-dominated, whereas bridge has a mixed gender profile. There was a lot of laughter on each table, so we knew it was going well irrespective of the quality of the play. A lot of younger people are taking up bridge as part of the movement away from digital games towards social games. Maybe Kingston Chess Club will have a bridge section one day.

We are grateful to Rosie White for having controlled this successful event and bringing the tablecloths and bridge equipment. We will canvass the views of those who attended and the wider membership to see if anybody would like to repeat the event or join a regular bridge class which could be held at the club.

If you are interested in how it went, you can talk to one of those people who attended, who included Peter Andrews, Marek Chmiest, Peter Finn, John Foley, Phil Goodings, Stephen Moss, Alan Scrimgour, Paul Seymour and Rob Taylor.

John Foley