Today, I’m going to show you how to make a Quoridor game to add to your family game collection. Quoridor is a fun strategy game that my family has become a huge fan of. Let’s have some fun!
Materials/Supplies
- 1/2 inch x 5 1/2 inch board at least 2 feet long (I used oak)
- 1×4 at least 2 feet long (I also used oak)
- Or 1×2 at least 4 feet long
- 1/4 inch board, likely 5 1/2 inches wide, at least 1 foot long (I used poplar)
- Table Saw (easiest, but can be accomplished by other means)
- Dado Stack (also easiest, but not only option)
- Miter Saw (optional)
- Random Orbital Sander
- Finish of your choice (I used Tung Oil)
- Wood Glue
- Clamps
Cut List
There are two ways to cut the materials for the board. You can cut everything slightly oversized, like I did, to give you some wiggle room during glue-up. Then you will come back and cut to exact length after glue has cured. Or, you can cut everything to exact length and be very careful during your glue-up. Below are the two different cut lists.
Oversized
- 1/2 inch board
- 2 – 12 inches
- 1×4 board
- 1 – 12 inches
- 1 – 15 inches
- Rip these both in half
- OR 1×2 board
- 2 – 12 inches
- 2 – 15 inches
Exact Sized
- 1/2 inch board
- 2 – 11 inches
- 1×4 board
- 1 – 11 inches
- 1 – 14 1/12 inches
- Rip these both in half
- OR 1×2 board
- 2 – 11 inches
- 2 – 14 1/2 inches
For the walls, cut the 1/4 inch material into several sections 2 inches wide. (I cut mine to 2 1/4 inches and found them to be ever so slightly too wide after trimming some of my glue-ups.) Then turn the sections 90 degrees and cut several pieces out of each one at 1 inch wide. You’ll need at least 20 of these walls to play the game.
For the pawns, use some of the off-cut 1/2 inch material to cut 1/2 inch x 1/2 inch pieces about 1 inch long.
Now that the cuts are out of the way, let’s get into how to actually make this thing!
Start by gluing the two 1/2 inch boards together to make one board 11 inches wide. It’s a good idea to use plastic or tape wrapped 1x2s as cauls to help hold the boards down. This will keep them from buckling up under pressure. The plastic will keep the glue from sticking to the cauls.
After the glue dries, you can now cut your board down to it’s final length of 11 inches. If you decided to live life on the edge and cut your boards to exact length right away, you can skip this step. I used my cross-cut sled on my table saw to do this, but you could easily do this with a miter saw.
Since we’re going to be cutting a bunch of dados into the top of this board, it’s a good idea to sand it up before doing that. The dados may wreak havoc on your sandpaper when you’re trying to smooth out the surface and clean up the glue. I used a random orbital sander to do this and it worked great. Sand it to 180 grit, or whatever finish grit you prefer.
Now it’s on to the dados that the walls will sit in. I used my dado stack set for 1/4 inch dados. If you don’t have a dado stack, you can make multiple passes with your table saw or miter saw with a stop set. If neither of these are an option for you, consult your friendly neighborhood YouTube for other options. I’m sure you’ll find something to your liking.
The main game board is made up of a 9 x 9 grid of spaces. Each space will be 1 inch by 1 inch. The dados separating them will be 1/4 inch wide and roughly 1/4 inch deep.
What I did was set my rip fence on my table saw to 1 inch. Then I made a pass, rotated the board 90 degrees, and made another pass. Rinse and repeat 4 times, one for each side. Then I moved the rip fence over by 1 1/4 inches and cut the next round of dados.
Once your dados are cut for the walls, you’ve got a fully functional Quoridor game board. If you want to keep it simple, you can apply your finish and call it a day. However, I wanted to add a frame of sorts, and cut additional dados in the frame for each player’s walls to sit in.
The above design has the wall dados cut at 90 degrees. In the finished build photos, you’ll see that I actually cut mine at 45 degrees. It was quite a hassle to try to space these evenly across the board, taking up the whole side. In fact, I messed it up and each side now has one slot that is cut too close to its neighbor. Looking back after completing that, it wasn’t worth the extra hassle to me. So I recommend cutting them at 90 degrees.
Each slot is a 1/4 inch dado, about 1/4 inches deep. Space them about 1/4 inches apart, or whatever feels comfortable. If you go with the 1/4 inch spacing, start the first one 3 1/8 inches from either side. Just remember that it won’t be centered, if you cut your pieces long. You could instead mark where you would like to edge of the main game board to line up once glued up and use that to measure your 3 1/8 inches from. Just remember this is a game board and it doesn’t have to be perfect. Nobody will notice a minor misalignment.
After you finish cutting all these dados in the frame and board, that will leave a lot of sharp edges. I recommend easing these edges with some sand paper. It’s a bit of a process, but leaves the board so much better to the touch.
Now it’s time to glue the frame onto the board. Remember to use cauls again to hold it all down.
Again, I cut my pieces long and ran the whole thing through the table saw to clean up both edges by taking a hair’s width off the game board itself. In order to do this, I glued up my frame in two passes. The first pass had the shorter sides with the wall dados. Then, once it had cured and I trimmed it up, I glued on the long sides and ultimately cleaned them up on the table saw too.
Once the frame is all set, you’re ready to apply your finish. I used Tung Oil, which soaks in nicely. This came in handy for all the dados because I could soak them with Tung Oil and by the next day it had soaked in. Doing something like stain here would be a pain to try to wipe up. If you’re going to paint, it may be a good idea to give a little extra width to your dados to account for paint thickness. It would be a bummer to get all finished up only to find that the walls don’t fit in the dados.
In order to tell the pawns apart, I also applied a stain to one of my pawns. I found that the oak didn’t take the stain very well, but it made enough of a difference to accomplish the task.
Now the only thing left to do is play the game!
The Rules
Quoridor can be played with 2-4 players, though it seems to be best with 2. Each player starts with their pawn on the center space on their side of the board. In a two player game, each player gets 10 walls. In a 3 or 4 person game, each player gets 5 walls.
The objective of the game is to be the first player to get their pawn to any space on the opposite side of the board.
For each turn, a player can either place a wall or move their pawn one space horizontally or vertically. The pawn cannot be moved diagonally.
Walls must be placed such that they block two spaces completely. Once a wall is placed, it can’t be moved. Walls cannot be placed such that a pawn is completely prevented from getting to the other side.
When moving pawns, they cannot jump over the walls. They can jump over the opponent pawns, though we allowed our pawns to just both occupy the same space.
The rules are simple, but there’s a lot of strategy that can be applied to make for a really fun and interesting game. Have fun with it!
If you like this project, check out some of our other wooden game builds!