German glass eyed staunton, c1960

I had always assumed that sets of this form were made by HUK in Switzerland (having owned one previously with a labelled box) - but this one came in a box with a stamp on the bottom "Made in GDR" (German Democratic Republic, AKA East Germany).  My collector friend, Bram, put me right, with a link to an archived page of the schachmuseum.com - these sets were made by the VEB Borstendorf factory in East Germany (HUK were just one of their largest customers).

Borstendorf, a village in the Ore Mountains (Erzgebirge) of East Germany, was known during the GDR era for its tradition of wooden toy production, particularly within the context of state-controlled industry. During the socialist era, small private workshops were often converted into or forced to work for VEB (Volkseigener Betrieb - People's Owned Enterprise) structures. K.P.Uhlig, the chess set maker famous for their bone sets, was based in Borstendorf.

The sets are very light, but with sweetly carved knights with well placed glass eyes - the knights are so precisly carved that I presume they were made by some repeatable mechanical process, rather than hand carving.  This set also has a rather striking stripey "black" side made out of an exotic wood, which I believe is zebrawood.